Borin Defends Dima: The General and the Commissar

Moon over Berlin, Sun over Santorini: B1C8

“Come in, Comrade Colonel Peltsin. Come in!”

General Borin stood, his booming voice filling his tidy inner office as young Alexey held the door open for the zampolit. The general dismissed his aide with a genial wave and fumbled for a battered silver cigarette case.

“Sit, Pyotr Gregorovich. Please! Be comfortable.”

He addressed his senior political officer in the very formal civilian style rather than by military rank, hoping to make a point. “Have a smoke? I’ve been enjoying German tobacco immensely since my arrival. Quite good, eh?”

Peltsin’s eyes narrowed, then he smiled slyly. “Indeed, Fyodor Petrovich,” he said, riposting with the same formal honorific. “One of the perks of living beside an enclave of the West. Have you also availed yourself of the wine? The whites from the Rhein valley are exceptional.”

Peltsin leaned over the desk, plucked a cigarette from the proffered case, and rolled it around in his fingers.

Borin smiled to himself as he snapped open his lighter, scenting the room with butane as he lit first Peltsin’s smoke and then his own. The colonel took a puff and burst into a fit of coughing…