The Charm School

hand on Lisa’s shoulder, and she stood.
    Landis said to his son, “Go on and play.”
    The boy ran off.
    Landis watched him, then said, “At first they thought that sex was enough, then they understood that some of us actually had a paternal instinct and our women had the maternal urgings. So they let us have children. They want to keep us contented here, busy with everyday things. But solutions lead to new problems. Like the kids. There are about sixty of them now. The oldest is the Brewer kid, Rick. He’s ten. Ted Brewer’s wife, Svetlana, was the first to conceive after they lifted the ban.”
    “And what,” Hollis asked, “is the problem?”
    “Well, they didn’t know how to bring up these kids. So they came up with this hybrid system where they teach the kids a modified American curriculum in English, but they also teach Russian history and Soviet ideology. It’s kind of screwed up. They think they can send these kids into America like they do the Russian students. But I don’t know. I think all these kids are going to go bonkers as they get older and realize they’re in prison.” Landis looked at his son, swinging again on the tire. “My poor little guy.”
    Lisa watched the boy awhile, then looked at Landis. “Do you teach him the truth at home?”
    “No.”
    “Why not? You could in subtle ways—”
    “Miss Rhodes, they told me that if they discovered I was doing that, they would kill the boy. Not take him away, but
kill
him. And kill my wife too.”
    “My God… I’m sorry…”
    Landis shrugged. “It’s all velvet gloves over steel fists here.” He looked at Hollis. “Say, Sam, did you ever happen to hear anything about my wife? I mean my American wife? Maggie?”
    “No, I don’t think so. I’ll try to remember.”
    “Would you? I’d appreciate that. I had two boys. Timothy… my other Timothy… and Josh. They’d be grown men now. Tim would be thirty, and Josh would be twenty-four. I sure hope they did all right. Hope Maggie remarried too.” Landis passed his hand over his face.
    Hollis had a strangely empty feeling in his stomach. He said, “Look, Tim, I think my presence is a little upsetting, so we’ll—”
    “No, no. Hey, I won’t ask any more of those kinds of questions. You two are probably a little disoriented yourselves. Come on in and meet Jane. That’s my wife. She’s Russian but likes the name Jane.”
    “No, thanks—”
    “Come on. You’ll like her. She’s a political. Real anti-Red. She got thirty years, but that’s like a death sentence in the camps. She did two years and then got offered the job here because she had some school English. I’d like you to meet her.”
    Lisa and Hollis exchanged glances, and Lisa said, “We’d like to meet her.”
    “Great.” They walked around to the front of the house, and Landis went on, “She got here about, let’s see… fifteen years ago. She dated around for about two years—we all did then. Wild time. Then most of us sort of paired off over the years.”
    Landis opened the front door of the house and called in, “Honey, we got company.”
    A voice called out in accented English, “Oh… Tim, the house is a mess.”
    Hollis and Lisa looked at each other and didn’t know whether to laugh or leave.
    Landis indicated the way toward the kitchen. Hollis noticed that the living room furniture was rather shabby and not particularly American-looking. It was blondewood, sort of 1950s, and may have been Scandinavian. The floor was Russian parquet, larch not oak, and the rug was an Oriental from one of the Soviet near-Eastern republics. Hollis saw a modern Sony TV with VCR and an audio system in a stack unit.
    They entered the kitchen, and Hollis felt that here indeed was little America. It was a well-equipped and fairly modern kitchen, with breakfast nook. The only thing that seemed to be lacking was a dishwasher. A General Electric coffeepot was perking on the white plastic counter. Mrs. Landis was scrubbing beets at the sink.
    Landis said, “Jane, these are our new neighbors, Lisa Rhodes, and an old comrade-in-arms, Captain—no, Colonel Sam Hollis.”
    Jane Landis wiped her hands on her apron and looked at both of them, then took Lisa’s hand. “Hello.”
    Hollis thought she was about forty. She was rather attractive and well-kept with grey-streaked black hair, cut in a pageboy style. She wore a turtleneck sweater, plaid skirt, and penny loafers. Hollis momentarily pictured a late fall day, somewhere