Lazlo Horvath Thriller - 01 - Chernobyl Murders

by Michael Beres

  “The men who fired at the statue carried Stechkin machine pistols, Deputy Chairman. I’m afraid they were set on full automatic.”

  “Perhaps we should issue field artillery to the Kiev office! Instead of simply blowing Lenin’s crotch away, they could have blown off his head and put the poor man out of his misery!” Dumenko pounded his fist on the desk. “Next time, Major, I expect more control of these situations! Do you realize the extent of damage to the walls and ceiling? Do you realize how many guests were scared shitless? Not to mention the female hotel guest yanked from her bath because she, like Juli Popovics, had dark hair!”

  Dumenko shook his head. “KGB agents shooting the balls off a statue, mortally wounding a sofa, and pulling a woman out of her bath. I feel sorry for you, Major. This brain disease of yours is taking its toll. Perhaps your men had a nip of vodka to give them strength. Is that what happened?”

  “None of my men drink while on duty, Deputy Chairman.”

  Komarov knew it was necessary to go through ridicule so that Dumenko would eventually listen to him. At last, after several more sarcastic statements, Dumenko asked about the escape of Detective Horvath and Juli Popovics. In the process of answering these questions, Komarov placed the blame for the incident on Captain Brovko.

  “Captain Brovko’s training in interrogation and nuclear engineering did not adequately prepare him for an emergency field situation.”

  “You feel a more experienced man might have performed better?” asked Dumenko.

  “I do not wish to blame the captain entirely, Deputy Chairman.

  I take responsibility for giving him the field assignment.”

  “I see,” said Dumenko. “I suppose I should also take some responsibility for assigning Brovko to you, and even the chairman is responsible for giving me authority to assign men, and so on up the line all the way to the president and general secretary. Is this how you view your responsibilities, Major?”

  “No, Comrade Deputy Chairman. Not at all. I take full responsibility. I did not mean to imply you were responsible in any way.”

  Dumenko waved his hand. “Enough of who is responsible and who is not. Times have changed. These days everything hangs in the open like laundry. So, what are you going to do about the investigation?”

  “I will continue to pursue it, Deputy Chairman. One of my men is dead, and Detective Horvath is a suspect in another murder case, a poet who was apparently an informant for Horvath. He’s a dangerous man. We have a twenty-four-hour guard on the woman who told us where to find him.”

  “Tamara Petrov. I read your report.” Dumenko raised his eyebrows. “And I’ve seen photographs of her in the interrogation room.

  Quite a handsome woman, one worthy of our protection.” Dumenko polished the top of his head with his palm and smiled. “Perhaps someday you can introduce me to Tamara Petrov. I find the literary arts fascinating.”

  Dumenko placed his hands back on the desk. His smile vanished.

  “Major Komarov, I must tell you the initial reason for your investigation seems weak in light of new information. Yesterday I spoke with the chairman of the State Atomic Energy Committee.

  He seems convinced the incident at Chernobyl was an accident.”

  Komarov stood and paced back and forth behind his desk to emphasize his seriousness.

  “Comrade Deputy Chairman, I’ve been involved in this case long enough to know I am not mistaken. Juli Popovics, hiding her treachery behind outspokenness for the environment, is a key figure. Transcripts from meetings with Mihaly Horvath and his fellow engineers often refer to ‘the bitch.’ I have evidence to convince me

  ‘the bitch’ is none other than Juli Popovics. She was most likely recruited long ago by Aleksandra Yasinsky, currently imprisoned for anti-Soviet activities. Mihaly Horvath is also a key figure, but weaker than Juli Popovics. In correspondence with his brother, Mihaly Horvath spoke often of his greed—purchasing an expensive car, getting a larger apartment, the usual capitalist goals. He indicated he might be able to obtain funds from his American cousin, Andrew Zukor.”

  Komarov paused dramatically before continuing. “I know I’ve sent reports saying the situation at Chernobyl is under control. And the explosion and resulting fire remain under control to the best of our ability. However, if I am guilty of anything, it is my nayivete concerning the Horvath brothers, their American cousin, and Juli Popovics. There is conspiracy here.” He pointed to his chest. “I can feel it. I’ve heard the reports of human error at Chernobyl, and I still feel it. Of course, the ministries in charge are saying human error. What else can they say? But later, with all the facts on the table, when the radiation has diminished sufficiently to find clues indicating tampering, the KGB’s investigation will pay its dividends, Comrade Deputy Chairman. We’ll be ready to stand before any committee of inquiry. And if they are captured, Juli Popovics and Detective Horvath will confess. They have already lost one of their own. On Friday afternoon, when the shutdown was originally scheduled, Mihaly Horvath would have been able to escape. They were tricked by fate, Deputy Chairman. We should not be tricked so easily!”

  When Komarov finished his speech, he was breathless. He sat back at his desk, stared at Dumenko, and waited. After a minute of silence, Dumenko spoke.

  “You present a strong case, Major. Very well, you may continue the investigation.” Dumenko stood and walked to the door, where he turned back and pointed his finger at Komarov. “But remember, Major. I will not tolerate another Hotel Dnieper incident. Is that understood?”

  “Yes, Comrade Deputy Chairman.”

  The last time Komarov spent an evening alone on his back porch was the night after Detective Horvath and Juli Popovics escaped the Hotel Dnieper. The investigation had stalled, and he had relapsed, fallen victim to the bottle’s talons. When he awakened the next day, his wife told him she and Dmitry had carried him into the house and, unable to awaken him, almost called the doctor. It had taken his system two days to recover. Having vowed never to drink again, having come to his senses enough to convince Dumenko this afternoon to allow the case to continue, he was out on his porch again, alone and sober.

  To the west, three kilometers away, was the metro station where the Volga had been found. Across the river was the Hotel Dnieper and a million other places in which to hide. Detective Horvath would know them all. But were they still in Kiev, or had they moved on?

  Komarov lit a cigarette and thought back to his boyhood outside Moscow, where he’d seen groups of Gypsies camped across the river.

  He remembered hearing violins in the forest late at night while he was trying to fall asleep. He remembered the talk at school about Gypsies being run off by militia because they had been caught stealing livestock from local farmers. It seemed innocent then. Gypsies taking a few chickens to eat, the way he and his friends took a tomato or an onion from the fields when they were hungry. But later, when the Gypsy landlord confronted his father after the opera, he knew Gypsies were not the children of the forest they claimed to be.

  Gypsies hid among civilized citizens. The landlord who killed his parents was a Hungarian Gypsy. Barbara, who seduced and humiliated him during his hazing in the GDR, was half-Russian and half-Hungarian. Hungarians, Gypsies, people famous for their supposed contribution to the arts. The musical Czigany. The so-called poets and writers. Perhaps Horvath and Popovics were among them, hidden away in a Kiev garret.

  Komarov inhaled deeply on his cigarette, thinking of Tamara Petrov. Earrings flashing, bracelets clanging, hair as black as the night, black hair making her olive skin appear lighter than it was as she wept in his office, weeping because she had turned in one of her own.

  This afternoon, even Deputy Chairman Dumenko had fallen briefly under Tamara Petrov’s spell when looking at photographs of her in the interrogation room. Tamara Petrov grimacing and frowning and even laughing at the hidden camera while Captain Brovko questioned her. More trickery, appearing courageous when she was really a coward. Or was she?

/>   Komarov felt something on his finger and realized his cigarette had burned down to a butt. He put the cigarette out and lit another. He rubbed the surface burn, brought his finger to his nose, and smelled the acrid odor of burned flesh. The odor brought back memories of his years in the GDR at the “safe” house outside East Berlin. An old captain from the Great War named Alexeev used the method often. The captain would lean close to the victim, speaking softly, like a grandfather whispering to his grandchild. Then he would lock the victim in a grip with one arm and press his lit cigarette to the victim’s neck. Komarov had smelled this mixture of cigarette smoke and smoldering flesh many times when passing the interrogation room and hearing the screams of victims. It was a smell he had never forgotten.

  If Captain Alexeev had come back from the dead to terrorize Tamara Petrov in the interrogation room, would more have been revealed? Perhaps it would be wise to interrogate her again. Perhaps he could do a better job than Captain Brovko, especially if he did it under different circumstances.

  Komarov stood and put out his cigarette. He went into the house, where the only light came from the glow of the television in the living room. The television showed a rerun of Gorbachev’s spineless Chernobyl speech. On his way out the front door, he told his wife he would be gone at least two hours on business. Her only response was to raise her hand limply.

  Komarov parked a block away from Club Ukrainka and walked. He would be able to check on his men. And if his men did not recognize him, there was no need to explain his follow-up questioning of Tamara Petrov. Better to visit Club Ukrainka as a stranger in an overcoat with the collar drawn up about his face. When he passed the Volga, he saw both men inside. A flashlight lit up the seat between them for a moment. They were playing cards. He walked on, purposely giving himself a slight limp, and entered Club Ukrainka.

  The place was dark, the air thick with smoke and the smell of Turkish coffee. He sat at a table near the entrance and put out the candle on the table. He ordered coffee and paid for it as soon as it was delivered. He kept his coat on and held the cup in front of his face.

  Tamara Petrov was on the far side of the room at a table to one side of the small stage. Onstage, a thin, bearded man made his saxophone sound like an old man who had eaten too many beans. When the man stopped playing, a few people clapped, and the man went to Tamara Petrov’s table. The man’s cheeks had been puffed up when he played. Now they were sunken, and, in profile, Komarov recognized Jewish features. First the Gypsy, now a Jew who blows farts on his saxophone while she applauds him, smiles at him, invites him to her table, and perhaps to her apartment.

  Komarov imagined Tamara Petrov kissing the bearded Jew, using the wiry black beard to clean between her teeth the way prostitutes clean their teeth on pubic hair. Suddenly, he thought of Dmitry with a man, in bed with a man, the taste of salt and the feel of hair inside one’s mouth. A wave of nausea came over him, nausea so strong he had to go to the washroom and splash cold water on his face. The water from the spigot smelled metallic. He took deep breaths from the open window in the washroom. When he finally recovered, he returned to his table, held his coffee cup in front of his face, and watched Tamara Petrov.

  The saxophonist was back onstage, puffing his cheeks and playing something reminiscent of a Hungarian song played on a violin, a ridiculously romantic elongation of melody, a sound like someone weeping, the sound made by the old man with the violin in Lenkomsomol Square the night Detective Horvath escaped. And there was Tamara Petrov smiling at the Jew. When the Jew switched to a Middle Eastern melody and gyrated his hips, Tamara Petrov stood and applauded.

  If only Detective Horvath could be here now. If only he could see his Gypsy lover swooning like a child bride experiencing her first orgasm. Perhaps Horvath would be jealous enough to leave the club in anger, wait for Tamara Petrov in an alleyway, and confront her. A woman who first turns him in, then replaces him with a Jew so she can play his saxophone penis.

  Komarov held his cup in one hand, reached inside his coat, gripped his knife, and thought of Pudkov and the poet, their necks like wet muted violin strings as he sliced across them. He thought of Gretchen staring at him with surprise as he pushed the knife in and twisted.

  When the saxophonist approached the climax of his disgust-ing wail, and as Tamara Petrov remained standing, applauding, and gyrating her hips like a belly dancer, Komarov left Club Ukrainka.

  Outside, he lowered his head into his collar and took up his limp.

  When he passed the Volga, the men inside paid no attention to him.

  He walked a half block and hid around the side of a building in a dark alleyway. From this position, he could see the entrance of Club Ukrainka and he could see the heads of the two KGB men who would soon be disciplined severely for allowing Tamara Petrov to be murdered under their very noses.

  26

  The village of Kisbor on the Ulyanov collective was on a dry plateau less than twenty-five kilometers from the Czechoslovakian border.

  Although the Chernobyl accident was a topic of conversation, Kisbor residents felt relatively safe because Kiev was much closer and Kiev television news did not show citizens dropping dead in the streets.

  Instead of worrying about the reported insignificant amount of radiation in their area, citizens of Kisbor and the Ulyanov collective were more concerned with spring planting.

  Nikolai stood in the yard of the Horvath farm, watching the sunrise. The farmhouse was on a slight hill above the village, and only the tallest houses in Kisbor were visible, their peaked roofs like black witches’ hats against the orange sky. The morning was cool, and on the distant plain he could see patches of ground fog. According to local legend, these patches of fog were the last breaths of a person who had recently died. Perhaps one of the patches belonged to Pavel, his last breath drifting on the wind all the way from the town of Visenka, outside Kiev, and arriving now, his last breath wandering about until it came upon his friend Nikolai, who cradled him like a babe in his arms as he died.

  Nikolai walked around the side of the farmhouse where a rooster strutted back and forth on the tin roof of a lean-to chicken coop.

  The rooster’s claws on the roof sounded like someone scratching from inside a coffin. The rooster stopped strutting, puffed up its chest, and greeted the sunrise with a high-pitched wail.

  When he went into the backyard, Nikolai passed a weathered wooden box set in the ground. The box had an old oilskin tablecloth draped over it, and on it were two battered tin plates holding water from the last rain. Tarnished and bent knives and forks rescued by local children completed the make-believe table setting.

  Children. At the funeral, Pavel’s wife said they were going to have children. She repeated it over and over as he helped carry the coffin to the grave site set aside for Kiev’s KGB agents and militiamen. “He was only twenty-seven and no children!” screamed Pavel’s wife as the coffin was lowered.

  Shortly after Pavel’s funeral, Nikolai was sent here. In the farmhouse there were three children—a baby belonging to the Sandors, who lived in the house, and the two daughters of Nina Horvath, who had come from Pripyat by way of a Moscow hospital. Walking beyond the oblong box with its oilcloth, discarded utensils, and border of untrimmed weeds, Nikolai wondered about Detective Horvath’s boyhood here with his brother, little boys playing games just as he and Pavel had done when they were boys. Today the games were more serious. The winner’s prize was to remain alive. Today’s orders were to be alert for the possibility Detective Horvath and Juli Popovics might show up. And tomorrow? Who knew?

  Nikolai was not alone. He and the others took twelve-hour shifts alternating between the farmhouse and the small hotel in the village. Originally there had been four men. Now, with the arrival of Captain Brovko and three others, the total was eight. At any given time there were at least three of them at the house.

  Nikolai reached the end of the yard where tilled soil began, looked at his watch, and turned back when he heard tires on the gravel r
oad. He had been at the house for his twelve-hour shift and, walking to the side of the house, was glad to see Captain Brovko in one Volga and three replacements climbing out of a second Volga.

  One of the men stretched and yawned loudly. Nikolai joined the other two who had spent the night at the house, each of them alone, alternating positions every two hours. One man in the house, one in the car, and one walking about the perimeter, all three armed with Stechkin machine pistols.

  Nikolai was about to get into the second Volga with his two partners when Captain Brovko called him over and sent the other two ahead to the hotel. As the men drove away, Nikolai wondered what more could possibly happen to him.

  “Come,” said Captain Brovko. “I’ll drive you back.”

  The inside of the Volga was warm. For the moment, as Captain Brovko drove down the road into the dust of the other Volga, Nikolai felt safe. Here, in a warm Volga with his machine pistol stowed on the floor and his new captain driving, he was assured of not being attacked from behind by Detective Horvath returning to his boyhood home. No matter what Captain Brovko had to say, even if it was a reprimand, he was glad to be away from the house with its dark yard and the women inside who conveyed hatred by simply looking at him. Last evening when he took his turn in the house, Mariska Sandor, the resident farm wife, played a game with the little girls in which she claimed she could tell their fortunes by observing teacup stains. During the game, Mariska Sandor had turned to him and claimed she could tell how long he was going to live. The smile on her face when she said it frightened Nikolai, filling the remainder of the night with visions of Detective Horvath sending him to join Pavel in the grave.

  Shortly after the road curved and dropped down the small hill, Captain Brovko pulled over to the side and parked. Ahead, and slightly below, the village greeted the sun, clay tiles on the roofs taking on the color of rouge on a woman’s cheeks. The Volga carrying his two partners disappeared into the main street of the village, leaving only the dust settling above the road.