Tatiana put the cup down.

“Tania,” said Alexander, his eyes boring into her. How she wished he would stop holding her arm and looking at her. “Tania, do you know what the Germans did in Luga? You were there, didn’t you see? They rained these leaflets down on the volunteer women and young girls, who were digging the trenches and potatoes. Wear your white dresses and white shawls, they said, and we’ll know you’re civilian women and we’ll avoid shooting at you. The women said, oh, all right, and happily went to change and put on their best whites, and the Germans, as they were flying overhead, saw their dresses from 300 meters in the sky and slaughtered them all right there in the trenches. It made targeting them so much easier.”

Tatiana pulled her arm from him.

“Now, go and change. Put on something brown. And warm.” Alexander got up. “I’ll make my own tea.” Looking at Dasha, he added coldly, “And, Dasha, do me a favor—don’t ever confuse me with anyone who has hurt your sister.”

“Can you stay?” Dasha asked.

He shook his head. “Have to report to the garrison by nine.”

They ate soup with a bit of cabbage leaf. Black bread as heavy as brick, a few tablespoons of buckwheat kernels, and some unsweetened tea. They gave Alexander a shot of their precious vodka. He went and found wood in the basement and made a nice fire. It got warm in the room. How remarkable, Tatiana thought.

Alexander was at the table, with Dasha on one side and Mama on the other and Marina standing behind him. Babushka remained on the couch. And Tatiana was in the farthest corner, looking into her beige tea. Everyone was around Alexander, except for her. She couldn’t even get close.

“Alexander?” Mama asked. “Dear, it must be so hard for you at the front thinking about food all the time, like us.”

“Irina Fedorovna,” said Alexander, “I’ll tell you a little secret.” He bent his head to her. “When I’m at the front, I don’t think about food at all.”

Rubbing his arm, Mama spoke again. “Is there any way you can get my girls out of Leningrad? We’re almost out of food.”

Shaking his head and trying to disentangle himself from the women, Alexander said, “It’s impossible. Anyway, you know that I’m not on the Ladoga command. I’m below on the Neva, bombing the German positions across the river in Shlisselburg.” He shuddered. “They’re just relentless. But besides, the lake is not frozen over yet, and the barges—There are over two million civilians in Leningrad, and only a few thousand have been evacuated by barge out of the city, all of them children with their mothers.”

“We are also children with our mothers,” said Dasha.

“Small children with their mothers,” Alexander corrected himself. “All of you work—who is going to let you go? You and Dasha are making uniforms for the army,” he said to Mama, patting her. “Tania works in the hospital. How are you doing there, Tania?” His eyes were on her. She had moved near the window, away from the dining table.

Tatiana shrugged. “Today I sewed forty-two sacks. Still wasn’t enough—seventy-eight people died. Mama, I wish I could bring a sewing machine home for you.”

Mama turned around and glared at Babushka on the couch, who said in a defeated voice, “You used to like the potatoes I brought, daughter. Now I have nothing to give you.”

“Tomorrow,” said Alexander, “I will bring potatoes from the army store. I’ll bring you a little white flour. I’ll bring you everything I can. But I can’t get you out. Did you hear about the gunboat Konstructor? It was crossing Ladoga with women and children on board, headed around the Ladoga horn to Novaya Ladoga, and it was hit. The captain avoided one bomb. The second one sank his ship, drowning all 250 people.”

Dasha declared, “I would rather take my chances here in Leningrad than die in the cold sea like that.”

“How have you all been holding up?” Alexander said. “Marina, are you hanging in there?”

“Barely,” Marina said. “Look at us all.”

“You’ve looked better,” Alexander agreed, glancing at Tatiana, who said emptily, without glancing at him, “Anton died. Last week.”

“Yes,” said Dasha. “Maybe now Nina will stop coming around asking you for food for him.”

“I’m sorry Anton died, Tania,” Alexander said. “You’re not giving away your food, are you?”

Tatiana didn’t reply. “Have you heard from Dimitri?” she asked, changing the subject. “We haven’t heard a word.”

Lighting a cigarette and shaking his head, Alexander said, “Dimitri is in the Volkhov Hospital fighting for his life. I’m sure he doesn’t have the energy to write.” He and Tatiana glanced at each other.

The air-raid siren sounded. Alexander looked around the table. No one moved. “Does anyone go down to the shelter anymore, or has Tania corrupted each and every one of you?” he asked over the shrill wailing sound.

Wrapping her cardigan tighter around herself, Dasha replied, “Marina and I still go every once—”

“Tania, when was the last time you went to the shelter?” interrupted Alexander.

Tatiana shrugged. “I went just last week,” she said. “I sat next to a woman who wasn’t speaking to me. I struck up a conversation three times until I realized she was dead. And not recently dead either.” Tatiana raised her eyebrows.

“Tania, tell the truth,” said Dasha. “You were there for five seconds, and the bombing went on that night for three hours. And when was the time before that?”

“September,” said Mama casually, getting up and going to get her sewing.

“Mama, you know what? You’re a fine one to talk,” exclaimed Dasha. “You haven’t been there since September either.”

“I have work to do. I’m trying to make extra money. You should do the same.”

“I do, Mama! I just take my sewing to the bomb shelter.”

“Yes, and I saw what you did to that uniform—attaching the arm upside down. Can’t sew in the near-dark, Dasha.”

While they were bickering, Tatiana watched Alexander, and he watched Tatiana.

“Tania,” he asked, “you haven’t taken off your gloves all night. Why? It’s so warm in the room. Stop standing by the window where it’s cold. Come and sit down with us.”

“Oh, Alexander!” Marina exclaimed, putting her arm around him. “You’re not going to believe what your Tanechka did last week.”

“What did she do?” he asked, turning to Marina.

Dasha stepped in with, “Your Tanechka? No, Alexander, we mean, you really won’t believe it.”

“I want to tell it.” Marina was petulant.

“Somebody tell it,” said Alexander.

Tatiana groaned. “Do I have to stay for this?” she said, walking over to the table and collecting the cups. “Maybe Alexander can throw some more wood on the fire.”

He immediately rose and went to the stove, saying, “I can throw wood on the fire and listen.”

Dasha continued for Marina. “Last Saturday, Marinka and I were coming back from the public canteen on Suvorovsky. We had left Tania in the room, we thought peacefully sleeping, but as we’re coming back, Kostia from the second floor is running toward us on the street, yelling, ‘Hurry, your sister is on fire! Your sister is on fire!’ ”

Alexander came back to the table and sat down. His eyes were still on her, but Tatiana had noticed they had become considerably less warm.

“Tania, dear, why don’t you tell Alexander the rest?” Dasha said. “I think it would be more fun coming from you. Tell him what happened.”

Tatiana, her hair short, her eyes sunken, her frame withered away, her arms full of her family’s dishes, said, “Nothing happened.”

“Why don’t you tell me, Tatiana?” said Alexander, glaring at her.

She tutted and stared at Marina with disapproval. “Kostia is too small to be on the roof by himself. I went up to help him. A very small incendiary exploded, and he couldn’t put the fire out by himself. I helped him, that’s all.”