‘What’s your interest in him?’ I asked.
Hammerson was surprised by the question. We may have agreed to work together, but did that mean he had to tell me everything?
‘He wants to come and live in America,’ he said with some reluctance. ‘That’s what he tells us, anyway.’
‘Hasn’t he sung that song before?’ I said.
‘I don’t have official sanction to be here,’ he said. ‘I guess it’s much the same for you too.’ Before I could say anything, he added: ‘Nobody wants to be seen in public holding hands with Krasov, but no one wants the other side to get him either. So they entrust him to people like you and me. Look for the written instruction sending us both here and you won’t find any. If things go wrong, the people we work for can disown us. Gives you a good warm feeling, doesn’t it, knowing that officially you don’t exist?’
‘He must have something special we all want,’ I said.
‘The ladies like him,’ Hammerson said. ‘And he plays the piano well. That should be enough for most people, shouldn’t it?’
It was early afternoon but already darkness had fallen and I could no longer make out our surroundings. Hammerson appeared to sleep. Mika smiled at me from time to time but said nothing. We drove on steadily through the frozen countryside. Some hours later, the lorry slowed as we drove over a wooden bridge, expanses of ice on either side. I guessed it was a causeway to an island. Then on to solid ground once more, through a small birch wood until we came to a halt outside what looked like a farmhouse.
Mika helped Hammerson and myself down. I was stiff with cold. Hammerson banged his hands together to get the circulation moving.
‘Come and meet our guest,’ Mika said, leading the way into the house.
I was unprepared for the contrast between the darkness and cold of the world through which we had travelled, and the warmth and light of the room in which we stood. Brightly varnished wooden floors, walls and ceilings, almost orange in colour, reflected chandeliers that threw a glistening light around the room; mirrors and pictures adorned the walls. At the centre of it all was a large ceramic stove, a basket of recently cut logs beside it. Sitting beside the stove was Krasov.
He looked up as we came into the room.
‘My friends,’ he said. ‘Here is man starving to death. Food in this country is uneatable. Be prepared not to live long.’
8
RUTH
Dawn.
Or what passes for dawn in this summer land without night. The sun is rising slowly. The sea remains a steely grey, encasing the shore. There is no movement anywhere, either outside the house or inside, and no sound: no waves breaking, no birds singing, no human voices, not even her own now. She has not said anything for some minutes and nor has Stevens.
But she knows that she must finish the story she is telling him; there must be an end to it. Only then will she be able to ask forgiveness for the wrong she has done. To leave without that would be intolerable, unthinkable.
She watches the sun rise inch by inch above the horizon and then she breaks the silence.
*
‘The explosion occurred in the early hours of February the eighteenth,’ she says. ‘By eight o’clock that morning, we’d heard unofficially that D4, a laboratory on the outskirts of Moscow, had been damaged but we didn’t know how badly nor if anyone was hurt. Our requests for information were met with silence.
‘This is not unusual. We knew it would be some time before an official explanation was ready. Every event has to be reinvented to fit correctly within the ideological frame. But the continued official silence made us suspect that the damage to D4 must be serious. The truth was worse than we had feared.
‘“All that’s left is a hole in the ground,”’ Alexei Tomasov told us after a secret night visit to the site of the laboratory, now sealed off, he said, behind a wooden fence which had been hastily erected and wrapped with barbed wire. Police with dogs patrolled the area.
‘Then to his horror he saw that the fire had spread from D4 to a neighbouring block of flats. What had once been a five-storey building was now a blackened, eyeless skeleton, no windows, no doors, again sealed off and patrolled.’
(Suddenly she has a sense of déjà vu. She is listening intently to Alexei Tomasov describe what he has seen. She knows what he is saying. She has heard it all before. But when? When?)
‘Alexei asked what happened on the night of the fire. He found few people willing to talk. Most shook their heads and said they thought it was an earthquake or a new war starting. Violent explosions had shaken the district. They were terrified.’
Was there more than one explosion? he asked.
There was a hell of a bang and the laboratory disappeared in a cloud of smoke, he was told. Not long after there was another explosion and the apartment block caught fire.
How bad was the second explosion?
You couldn’t survive a blast like that, they said. The place burned out very quickly. It was badly built, done on the cheap like all the buildings round here. There’d been a fire in another similar block only a week or two before and that was a raging inferno in minutes – by the time the fire brigade got there it was gutted, nothing left.
How many people lived in the apartment block?
Sixty? Maybe more. No one was sure. About sixty. Old people. Pensioners. Veterans of the war.
What happened to them after the explosion?
Silence.
Were there any dead or injured? he asked cajolingly. If the place burned out quickly and the inhabitants were old people, then some of them must have been hurt.
They died, was the reply.
How many?
More shaking of heads. Impossible to say.
Ten? Twenty? Thirty?
The building was an inferno, the area was closed off. There were soldiers there, lorries, ambulances, firefighters. You couldn’t get near the place.
Most of the pensioners died? he asked.
Most of them, yes.
And the survivors?
No one knew what happened to them or if they knew, no one was telling. In their evasiveness Alexei read that the casualties were too high for anyone to dare mention the figure. He guessed twenty dead at least, possibly more.
It’s the laboratory, isn’t it? We’ve been saying for years they should move it. The things that go on there. It shouldn’t be allowed in a civilian area.
Possibly, he said, matching their vagueness with his own. It was too early to be sure of anything yet.
‘Then (she continues) we were dismayed to learn that some of our best technical staff had died in the fire. We had no idea why anyone should be working in the lab in the early hours of the morning.’
By now the fire is no longer simply an accident: it has become a disaster. Each day brings more questions. Why is the laboratory fenced off? Why are they prohibited from visiting the site? What were their own people doing there at that time of night? What could possibly have happened to cause an explosion of such magnitude? Without the official report, no one in authority is empowered to give any answers. The unease at the Institute grows. They are agreed that work on the development of the nuclear bomb has received a severe setback.
Ruth’s committee meets secretly to discuss the accident. Their mood is sombre. Something has gone terribly wrong and they must find the cause. They are concerned that some mistake on their part may have killed their colleagues. They are frustrated by the official obstacles put in their way. Appeals to the director of the Institute for more information have no effect.
‘The technicians in D4 were very experienced,’ Tomasov says, ‘which makes what happened all the more devastating.’
‘Men like Miklos Khudiakov are irreplaceable,’ Gromsky laments.
The materials they were dealing with, Tomasov reminds the comrade members of the committee, particularly plutonium, are both volatile and toxic. Something could have gone wrong. It needs only one small mishap to create a catastrophic accident.
Lykowski mocks him. The men who have died were their best technicians. Tomasov is casting a slur on their memories. Such men don’t make elementary mistakes.
Tomasov replies testily: there was an explosion. The laboratory blew up. What is Lykowski’s explanation?
But no one has an explanation because there are no details on which to base any hypothesis. Without evidence, without being allowed on to the site, the necessary investigation cannot take place. Speculation, Ruth tells them, only reminds them of their lack of knowledge and therefore achieves nothing. They must wait until the authorities issue their report and allow the necessary procedures to take place.
She sounds like Senior Technician Maximov reading from one of her lists of instructions. But she knows there is no alternative. She hopes they can curb their impatience and wait.
*
Four days later the official version of the accident is issued. There was a single explosion, it reads, set off deliberately by imperialist enemies of the state who have been caught and punished. Unfortunately, given the high wind that night and despite the valiant efforts of the fire services, flames were driven from the laboratory to the nearby apartment block, causing damage at a secondary site and minor injuries to some pensioners. The four technicians who died are heroes, they were working through that day and night to complete the state’s tasks. We mourn their loss, the report exhorts, and we honour them for their selfless sacrifice.
No one believes this version of events because it fails to address any of the fundamental questions (there is nothing new in that). What could have caused such a violent explosion, with such devastating results? How could the fire have spread from the laboratory to the apartment block when there is an empty concrete expanse between the two buildings? Why should those on the spot report two or more explosions when the official report speaks of only one? Why were those men working at night when no night work was scheduled? Who are these unidentified ‘enemies of the state’ who have been captured?
Deputy Director Dimitriov calls a special meeting of all senior staff to set out new schedules to recover the time lost. The destruction of the laboratory is causing great disruption to their research, he reports. Not only has valuable experimental work been lost, the Institute now has no immediate access to equipment or a secure working area for the development of techniques for the casting of plutonium. The programme, already late, is now delayed still further. Plans are in preparation to reverse this situation. He asks Senior Technician Maximov to issue the new schedules.
It is an open secret that the new timetables are hopelessly unrealistic but there are no dissenting voices because they all know they are being asked to work to a political, not a scientific, agenda. The truth will come out at the appropriate moment when they will make the usual disclaimers: ‘It was not my fault’, ‘No one could have foreseen the difficulties encountered’, all the well-practised escape routes on which their working lives depend. Somewhere (somehow?) a culprit will be found, but not one of the Institute’s scientists, who are too valuable to be blamed.
Ruth is impressed by how quickly arrangements are made for them to use another laboratory for the plutonium casting. Within a few days the next experiment is set up in D7. She pays an early-morning visit to inspect the preparations.
‘Ruth. Ruth.’
Elizabeth Markarova, in some distress, is beckoning. ‘Look. Over there. With the moustache. See him?’ All this beneath her breath, a frenzied whisper. Silly, nervous woman.
‘Who is he?’ Ruth asks.
‘I’ve no idea,’ Elizabeth says, her whispers sharp with impatience. ‘I don’t care who he is – all that matters is he works here.’
Elizabeth pulls her away, out of sight of the white-coated man with the moustache. Their heads touch. ‘Do you know what he said just now? I can’t believe it. I can’t bring myself to believe it.’
‘Tell me.’
Elizabeth nervously reassures herself that she cannot be overheard. ‘He said the space we are occupying here, in D7, was made ready a week before the accident. Do you know what that means, Ruth?’
She knows only too well. Actions like that cannot happen without official clearance. The conclusion she draws is ominous.
‘Take no notice,’ she says quickly, hoping that Elizabeth Markarova will be impressed by the authority in her voice. ‘The man’s a fool.’
‘He said they were instructed to clear this area a week before.’ Elizabeth repeats her message, urging Ruth to hear it.
‘Wild talk. Ignore it.’ She can see Elizabeth’s confidence draining away.
‘Do you think so?’
‘There could have been any number of reasons for clearing the area,’ she says dismissively.
‘Don’t you believe me?’
‘I don’t believe him.’
For the first time since the news broke, she feels frightened. If the white-coated man with the moustache is right, the evidence appears to support the theory that the explosion was not an accident. (‘Enemies of the State’, as Pavel Lykowski reminds them, is the code used when the authorities refuse to tell what they know. What alarms her more is that they are still not allowed to visit the site of D4.) There have already been murmurings of this among the committee, which she has done her best to control. Wild speculation, bred from the manipulation by the authorities of the information about the explosion, will cloud their judgement. This is the time for clear heads. They must discover what happened in D4 to prevent further loss of life. She is holding to the view that the responsibility is theirs, and for the moment they go along with her, accepting that it is too easy to become prey to extravagant ideas just because they do not yet know the true cause of the accident. But she knows that, without some breakthrough, she cannot hold them to this line much longer.
*
The breakdown in the discipline of the committee comes sooner than she had expected.
These men were murdered, Lykowski says with a certainty that shocks them.
Murdered? Who murdered them? Why? How?
An external agency placed a bomb in the laboratory and detonated it, he says.
Lykowski has neither evidence nor motive for such an assertion, Tomasov replies angrily. Lykowski points out the inability of the authorities to come up with any credible explanation of the cause of the accident and the director’s refusal to help them. The official silence speaks volumes. What further evidence does he need?
The discussion that follows is unexpectedly bad-tempered. Pavel Lykowski sticks to his charge that this is an ‘official’ accident, which means it is murder by agents of the state acting under orders from whom: the KGB? The Central Committee? The Politburo? His theory of murder by official sanction is opposed on all sides.
‘What about the apartment block?’ Tomasov asks, switching targets. ‘How do you explain that?’
‘A second bomb was placed there,’ Lykowski replies.
‘You don’t know that,’ Gromsky says. ‘What evidence do you have? The fire could easily have spread from the laboratory to the block of flats.’
‘Measure the distance between the laboratory and the apartment block. Sixty metres of concrete desert. Fire doesn’t travel that distance unaided.’
‘Are you saying these pensioners were murdered too?’
‘It’s the only possible explanation.’
‘Sixty old people pose a threat to the state, do they?’ Gromsky’s attitude is that Lykowski is talking dangerous nonsense. Why should anyone want to blow up a building full of pensioners? He begs them to keep their heads and ignore Pavel’s extravagant inventions.
‘What possible purpose can the deaths of a lot of elderly veterans serve?’ Elizabeth Markarova asks, now unconvinced.
‘The murder of innocent people,’ Lykowski explains, ‘has a long history of justification in the Soviet Union. Are we not all familiar with the concept of the “small sacrifice” for the greater good? How much blood has been spilled, how many lives lost in this way?’
/> As Lykowski says this a memory passes before her like a shadow. It carries a truth she must recognize if she is to understand why this event is so familiar to her. But as she reaches for it, the ghost of the recollection slips away into darkness and out of her grasp.
‘What greater good were these men and women sacrificed for?’ Tomasov asks, his disbelief thinly disguised.
‘Their murder is a warning to us,’ Lykowski insists. ‘The disaster at D4 is a reminder that the state is all-powerful and will not tolerate deviation from the official line.’
There is an immediate, noisy rejection of this view. It is too extreme. The state would not kill so many innocent people in order to tell a few scientists that from now on they must toe the official line. That assumption is absurd. There are many better ways to do that. Lykowski is shouted down. He shouts back. This senseless act is a declaration of war, he says. Let the hostilities begin. He at least is ready for the fight.
Gromsky takes a more cautious line. ‘It is too easy to give in to paranoia,’ he says, risking the accusation that he is on the side of the state. ‘We must not imagine that every act has a sinister connotation, that in the Soviet Union an innocent explanation can no longer exist. Until there is hard evidence to the contrary, it must be seen for what we firmly believe it to be – an accident, albeit a terrible one.’
Tempers boil up and spill over. Gromsky and Tomasov both demand that Lykowski resign from the committee. His continued membership should be put to the vote. Before there can be a show of hands, Lykowski has physically attacked Tomasov and knocked him to the ground. The two men have to be forcibly separated from one another.
Ruth has said nothing so far but now she has to act. She knows it may already be too late to reconcile these two positions and that this quarrel could destroy their committee. She speaks as calmly as she can, hoping her voice will quell their hot tempers and that her words are those Andropov would choose. (If only he had written this scene for her.)
Making Enemies Page 18