Chernobyl Murders (25 page)

Finally, Komarov got Nikolskaia to agree Juli Popovics surrepti-tiously entered Kiev, leaving the car in which she had escaped Pripyat and going on foot, using methods to avoid authorized KGB

observation.

“Juli Popovics knew she was being followed by the KGB,” said Komarov. “She has something to hide and has gone out of her way to lose herself in Kiev. Is that correct?”

“Yes,” said Nikolskaia, obviously afraid to say no.

By the end of the session, Nikolskaia was more than willing to complete and sign a preliminary report in Komarov’s office, with Captain Azef called in as witness. Nikolskaia and his partner would make a full report later in the day. Komarov ordered two men to replace Nikolskaia’s partner watching Juli Popovics, and the two PK agents from Pripyat would return to Komarov’s office for further orders.

After Nikolskaia and Azef were gone, Komarov lit a cigarette and returned to his window. Down on the street, he saw Nikolskaia enter a battered Moskvich, which smoked as it started. He would keep the PK agents on the case, dress them up in new suits, and give them a Volga to drive. In their new positions as KGB investigators, they would, if there was ever an inquiry, collaborate the evidence of the conspiracy uncovered by Major Grigor Komarov.

Komarov left his window and returned to his desk. He placed a call to Major Dmitry Struyev, the only member of Directorate T

in the Kiev office. Struyev was a trusted comrade, a so-called hard-liner. He was rarely in his office, but today he answered his phone.

“I am calling about a matter I brought up some time ago,” said Komarov.

“Proceed,” said Struyev, a man of few words.

“The American visiting Hungary has become a problem.”

“Gypsy Moth?”

“Yes,” said Komarov. “He has information critical to our nuclear program and is about to pass the information along. I need to be certain he does not.”

“I understand,” said Struyev. “Is there anything else?”

“No.”

They hung up without further comment. Komarov went back to his window and looked west. Somewhere beyond the Carpathians, Andrew Zukor would soon meet a man sent by Struyev. Whatever knowledge Zukor had would be gone, and the Chernobyl conspiracy would strengthen. As he stood at his window, Komarov felt the irony of his son, Dmitry, having the same name as the man he had just called.

Although Juli took precautions to limit her radiation exposure, she felt there was more she could have done. Instead of waiting to use the ladies’ room at the Hotel Dnieper to wash and change clothes, she should have used the ladies’ room earlier in the metro station.

Back in Pripyat, instead of going to see about Mihaly’s family, she should have stayed in the apartment.

As if he knew about the baby, Mihaly’s brother seemed anxious, taking time to call a hospital and arrange tests, driving her himself, and waiting for her. When the tests were completed, Lazlo came to her with a look of compassion.

“What did they say?” asked Lazlo.

“The counters showed nothing above normal. They took a blood sample. I’m supposed to call about the results tomorrow.”

“Did they give you anything?”

“Potassium iodide. It limits the amount of radioactive iodine in my system, especially my thyroid.”

She didn’t tell Lazlo the doctor who treated her gave her an extra dose of potassium iodide for the baby and recommended she consider an abortion.

Lazlo asked when she had eaten last. When she said twenty-four hours earlier, he took her to a nearby restaurant, where they ate thick borscht and pork sandwiches.

Lazlo wanted to know about her trip, about her plans. She gave details about the explosion Saturday morning, the precautions she and Marina had taken, the visit to Mihaly’s apartment, and the long wait before Vasily came for them on Sunday. She told him about Aunt Magda in Visenka. Lazlo said it was only a half-hour drive to the south, and he would take her.

“We fled south like war refugees,” said Juli. “Chernobyl workers and farmers alike. I heard people speaking Russian, Ukrainian, Slavic, and Hungarian. The voices seemed to come from another world.”

While Juli spoke, Lazlo stared at her. His eyes were dark and sincere, conveying a feeling of experience, knowledge, and gentleness.

A mature Mihaly, a man devoted to duty. His hair was graying but thick, and seemed windblown despite being inside the restaurant.

“We are in another world,” said Lazlo. “Mihaly once told me others at the plant considered Hungarians aloof. I remember when I was a boy having to learn Russian. I remember helping teach Russian to Mihaly. When it was time to move to Kiev, we had to learn Ukrainian. But we never lost touch with our first language. We spoke it whenever we were together.”

“I also remember learning languages,” said Juli. “My father taught me Hungarian while my mother taught me Russian. They fought over which language I should use. When I was a little girl, I used the two languages to pit my parents against one another, to get my way. It was only later, in Pripyat, when I began learning Ukrainian.”

“When was the last time you saw Mihaly?” asked Lazlo.

“Friday after work on the bus. He said he would be working on the shutdown.”

“What did he talk about?”

“The shutdown, the reasons for it.”

“Did he seem nervous?”

“Yes. He said it was dangerous doing the shutdown because of things recently going wrong. He spoke often of inadequate safety at the plant. It was a low-power experiment he didn’t think necessary … I didn’t expect this to happen … his wife and girls going to the plant … I feel responsible. I could have done something to prevent this. I failed. I …”

Lazlo touched her hand. “You can’t blame yourself for what fate brings.”

“I blame myself because Friday, when I spoke with Mihaly, I felt very selfish. I was the only person in the world who couldn’t have what she wanted. Mihaly was going back to his wife, and I was going back to loneliness. So now where is Mihaly? And where is his family?” Juli wiped her eyes with her table napkin. “Forgive me. I’m good at only weeping and messing with lives where I don’t belong.”

“Would you like to leave for your aunt’s now?”

“Yes.”

On the way out of the restaurant, several patrons looked at her sadly like those on the buses waiting to get into Kiev, but also like the faces on the bus taking Mihaly away Friday afternoon so long ago.

Before driving Juli to her aunt’s, Lazlo called headquarters. Deputy Chief Investigator Lysenko told him that personnel from the Ministry of Energy had joined the militia at the roadblocks and people were being measured with Geiger counters. Technicians sprayed those contaminated with a solution from tanker trucks.

“Who ordered this?” asked Lazlo.

“The Health Ministry,” said Lysenko. “In any case, you’re due back at the roadblock from Korosten tonight at midnight. The army is evacuating everyone from the area around Chernobyl, and Chief Investigator Chkalov has ordered double shifts.”

While driving out of Kiev, Lazlo turned on the radio for local news. Radio Moscow’s report was short, the commentator saying an accident had occurred at the Chernobyl nuclear facility north of Kiev, but everything possible was being done.

“Everything possible is being done,” commented Juli. “Which is absolutely nothing for all the people who sat in their homes not knowing about the radiation. I should have warned people. I should have gone from apartment to apartment.”

When he stopped at a traffic signal, Lazlo looked at Juli. She stared at him, and for an instant he felt a floating sensation, an insane moment when reality slips away to a parallel world created by a slight turn of events. In this parallel world, he marries Nina, and she sits beside him in coat and scarf. It was easy to imagine because Juli’s soft features and the green of her eyes reminded him of Nina, or of what Nina had secretly meant to him.

Juli continued staring at him. “I was selfish,” she said. “But perhaps I have reason. Last Friday night I was going to tell Mihaly …

not to make him responsible … I was going to tell him … I was going away for several months … to have our baby.”

A car horn sounded from behind, and Lazlo drove on, feeling as though the entire universe had slipped a notch.

The Dnieper River bridge south of Trukhanov Island was sometimes referred to by citizens of Kiev as a bridge between two worlds.

On one side was Kiev, with its Monument of the Motherland and its hills and trees and architecture from earlier centuries when a structure was more than mere shelter. On the other side of the bridge was Darnitsa, set back beyond the river foliage on flatlands, its rectangular buildings like so many dominoes.

South out of Darnitsa along the eastern shore of the Dnieper, the hills across the river rose steeply. The river was wide, capturing the shadows of the hills. A passenger steamer heading south to the Black Sea added perspective to the picture postcard. As she watched the view out the car window, Juli imagined she was with the father of her future child on a holiday trip to Odessa and there was no such thing as radiation, or even atoms. Everything was solid and stable and would last forever.

“Last summer,” said Lazlo, “at the farm near the Czech frontier, Mihaly told me his concerns about safety at Chernobyl. Later in the year, when I visited Pripyat, he told me about you. I should have followed up about the plant.”

“Mihaly was not the only one worried about safety,” said Juli.

“If you worked at Chernobyl, you got used to constant talk of safety, or lack of safety. The jokes higher officials called gossipmongering caused memos to be sent to supervisors. The chief engineer jokes the plant is nothing more than a steam bath, nothing but hot water.

But death is no joke. No one laughs now. As for Mihaly telling you about me, I have my own feelings.”

“What do you mean?” asked Lazlo.

“Mihaly and I didn’t mean to upset his family life. Our relationship was ending when his wife found out. All three of us were hurt deeply.”

“You think I told Nina about you? Mihaly asked if I did. I was angry with him. I felt I was being blamed for what you and he had done. I understand passion. Nothing is black and white. But to tell Nina, to hurt her …”

“Mihaly said you wouldn’t do it. I didn’t believe him. Now I do.”

“Why?”

“Because I can see you. It’s easy to mistrust someone until you meet him face to face. Mihaly was not like other men, and you are not like other men. Men in power are responsible for accidents like Chernobyl. In their quest for power, they ignore the future and the environment. It is the only thing we have to give our children. And now men … always men … have destroyed what little we have. But you and Mihaly …”

Lazlo looked straight ahead as he drove. His side window was open slightly, causing his hair to blow about. His profile, small chin and sloping forehead, was similar to Mihaly’s. A handsome man, but serious, as the situation deserved. A man determined to set things straight.

“Are you worried about your baby?” asked Lazlo.

“Of course. But I don’t want to think about an abortion. I’ll wait for the blood test results.”

“And if the results are not clear-cut?”

“I don’t know what to do. I was going to give the baby up for adoption. But now … I don’t know.”

The house was on the edge of the town of Visenka at the end of a road, which continued as a rutted trail into farm fields. The house was small, a cottage, and along the foundation in earth kept warm by the house, spring flowers bloomed. A small arbor covered with budding vines arched over the walk. When Lazlo followed Juli through the arbor, an old woman appeared at the door. She was short and plump and wiped her hands on an apron embroidered with flowers. When she opened the door, Lazlo could smell bread baking. The small size of the house, the farm fields in the distance, the appearance of this woman at the door … all of it reminded him of his boyhood in Kisbor. When the old woman hugged Juli and they spoke in Hungarian, the spell was complete.

“Detective Horvath is from Kiev,” said Juli. “He was kind enough to drive me here. This is Aunt Magda, my father’s sister.”

Aunt Magda’s hand was wrinkled and tough, a farm woman.

She looked at him suspiciously. “I’ve never met a Hungarian militiaman. Were you born in Ukraine?”

“Near the Czech border.”

“What do you know about this reactor business? What can I tell my neighbors?”

“I’ll let your niece explain. She knows more than me. I must leave now because I’ve been promised a meeting this afternoon at the Ministry of Energy office in Kiev.”

“Call me,” said Juli. “I hope you find out more about your brother’s family.”

“You have relatives near Chernobyl?” asked Aunt Magda.

“My brother’s wife and little girls. My brother worked at the plant … he was killed.”

“My God,” said Aunt Magda, holding Lazlo’s hand and looking up to him. “I’m very sorry for you. It’s not right these things happen. People killed, and the news says nothing. My God. Killed.”

She squeezed his hand. “Is there anything I can do?”

“No.” He looked to Juli, who stood behind her aunt, her cheeks wet with tears. “But I’ll let you know about his wife and two little girls.”

“Please do. I’ll pray for your brother and for them. I’ll keep candles burning.”

Juli turned away, wiping her cheeks with the back of her hand.

“Please write down your telephone number for Detective Horvath, Aunt Magda.”

When Aunt Magda began searching through a cabinet, Juli stepped close to Lazlo, kissed him quickly on the cheek, and said, “I lived in Moscow when I was a girl. They have the finest hospitals.”

When Lazlo left the house and stepped beneath the arbor, he saw a momentary flash of red up the road. He held several thick vine branches apart with his fingers and saw the car parked on the opposite side of the road about fifty meters away, facing the opposite direction. It was a faded red Zhiguli, partially hidden by an old truck. The left taillight was out, but he knew it had been lit a moment earlier.