Chernobyl Murders (30 page)

“Kisbor? Why would they send you there?”

“Because our relatives live there. Because we can’t go back to Pripyat.”

“I’m your relative. Why can’t you come here?”

There was static on the line, followed by silence.

“Nina?”

“I’m still here, Laz. I wanted to come to Kiev, but they insisted we can’t because of refugees already there. They said for the children it’s best to go farther away. In Kisbor the girls will be with people they know. Bela and Mariska and their baby …”

Nina sobbed for a moment before continuing. “I’m sorry. I need to tell you something. The KGB questioned me about Mihaly’s work at Chernobyl. They’re trying to implicate Mihaly, and I know they’re wrong. But there’s a woman … a technician named Juli Popovics. Mihaly … was involved with her.”

“Nina …”

“Don’t talk. I know Mihaly told you about her. I knew months ago. Mihaly promised they would stop seeing one another. I was so angry. I remember thinking at the time I wanted to make them suffer. Mihaly slept on the floor, and I slept in bed, alone with my anger. And now … now I’m simply alone. When I heard about the explosion, when my neighbor said she was driving to the plant, I took the girls, thinking it would help. I thought we could get Mihaly. He’d come out and we’d all go away together, and this other thing, this relationship with Juli Popovics, would be finished. He’d see us there, his family come to get him …”

When Nina finished weeping, Lazlo knew he would have to question her. But what could he say? Speaking of Juli and her pregnancy was out of the question. He also needed to avoid mentioning Cousin Andrew Zukor because of the possibility the phone was bugged.

“Nina, it’s not the right time, I know, but I must ask several questions. I have reason to believe the authorities might try to blame Mihaly for the accident.”

“But …”

“Listen. I’ve talked to the Ministry of Energy and … I’ve talked to Juli Popovics.”

“She’s there?”

“She came to Kiev with thousands of others. I think because of her relationship with Mihaly, they may try to use her in some way. Tell me, if you can remember, what kind of questions the KGB

asked you.”

Nina told Lazlo about the interview, how the interrogator asked general questions about their family, about life in Pripyat, and finally said he knew of Mihaly’s affair with Juli Popovics. She told about the blatant suggestion that Mihaly was involved in sabotage.

When Nina gave the name of the KGB officer who interviewed her, Lazlo asked her to repeat it.

“Komarov, first initial G. A major. Do you know him?”

“He’s head of the branch office in Kiev.”

“And now he’s here in Moscow … trying to put blame on Mihaly.”

“We can’t know for certain, Nina. Most important now is you and the girls. Did doctors examine you thoroughly?”

“They say Anna and Ilonka weren’t overexposed. They’ve gotten plenty of iodine. But I’ve talked to others. I know it could affect the girls in the future.”

“What about you?”

“It’s the same for me, but worse for children. Radiation is especially dangerous for growing cells. All I can do is pray. We ask God for help, and he gives us this. We’ll go to Easter mass here tomorrow, they’ll fly us to Lvov, and we’ll go to Kisbor. Come visit us there as soon as you can. And, Laz?”

“Yes.”

“Is Juli Popovics safe? Did she make it to Kiev without getting hurt?”

“Yes, she did.”

“Good. I have to go. Others are waiting to use the phone.”

“Kiss the girls for me, Nina.”

“I will.”

Easter dinner with Juli and Aunt Magda reminded Lazlo of boyhood Easters. Sausage, veal loaf, cheese, bread, and hard-boiled eggs, all prepared on Good Friday, put into the Easter basket, and taken to church to be blessed on Holy Saturday. The smell of the food evoked images from boyhood. His parents healthy and strong, his kid brother, Mihaly, running to keep up as they walked uphill from the village of Kisbor with the blessed food.

The Easter meal is served cold on a large platter. After prayer, a single blessed egg is peeled and divided equally among those present as a reminder of who shared the Easter feast. According to tradition, if you experience misfortune during the coming year, you will remember those with whom you shared the egg, and this will give you strength.

Aunt Magda’s Easter tradition was the same. She said decorated eggs dated back to before Christ. According to legend, as long as someone in the world decorated Easter eggs, the world would continue.

While he ate his portion of the blessed egg, Lazlo wondered if Mihaly had a chance to think of tradition before the reactor exploded.

After the shared egg was eaten, Lazlo uncorked the Hungarian wine he brought. He, Juli, and Aunt Magda gave a toast to safety and peace of mind for all Chernobyl victims and refugees. Aunt Magda said because she had no children, she had celebrated Easter alone since her husband died several years earlier. This year she was grateful to have guests. During their toast, Lazlo noticed that, although she held up her glass, Juli had only a sip of wine.

As they ate, the conversation naturally turned to questions about Chernobyl. Radio Moscow’s latest report was two deaths and a hundred or so injured. Lazlo described the roadblocks, the refugees sent to collective farms. Juli said years of illness and an increased probability of cancer could be expected among refugees and emergency workers.

“We may all die of this someday,” she said, putting down her fork and looking out the window. “Not suddenly, but gradually.

Chernobyl children will be frightened of rain and snow. Even those receiving potassium iodide have no guarantees.”

“No iodine for me,” said Aunt Magda. “I’d rather the children have it. Neighbors have asked about Chernobyl because they know Juli worked there. I don’t know what to say. Yesterday while I weeded the garden, Mariya Grinkevich said men are watching the house.”

Juli nodded and turned to Lazlo. “I’ve seen a car on the road with two men inside.”

“Don’t worry,” said Lazlo. “If you see them, it means they want you to know you’re being watched. It’s simply a warning.”

“Do they watch everyone who worked at Chernobyl?” asked Aunt Magda.

“I’m not sure,” said Lazlo.

“I think they would like to,” said Juli. “Mihaly said the KGB was constantly around, waiting for something to happen so they could cover it up.”

After dinner Aunt Magda stayed in the kitchen while Juli and Lazlo went into the living room. Lazlo sat on the sofa, watching as Juli walked to the front window. Her cotton dress hung loosely about her waist. The sun through the window enveloped her. Although Juli’s child did not show, the loose dress reminded him of Nina several summers earlier, pregnant with Ilonka.

“I can’t see the car now,” said Juli. “You said if I can’t see them I should worry.”

“I saw them on my way here,” said Lazlo. “They’re parked up the street near the corner.”

When Juli left the window and sat beside him on the sofa, Lazlo stared at her profile, wondering why she reminded him of Nina.

True, they both had brown hair, both were slender and about the same height. But Nina’s eyes were brown, whereas Juli’s were greenish-gray. She moved slightly closer and turned to face him. The sun from the window shadowing her face brought forth an image from youth. The visage of a fictitious young woman from boyhood dreams. A young woman not only beautiful, but someone to save from danger. The age-old boyhood fantasy, becoming a hero. However, boyhood was long gone, stolen away by the world of guns and reactors and the KGB.

Juli put her hand on his hand. “I’m sorry, Lazlo. I’ve done nothing but add sadness to your life.” Tears came to her eyes. “Your brother is gone, and I’m …”

“You haven’t created sadness, Juli. It’s always there, a part of life. Please go on. We need to talk about Mihaly.”

Juli took out a handkerchief and wiped her eyes. “So much of Mihaly is gone. He was always joking. It was part of him. He joked when he didn’t want to talk about something. He joked when I brought up his family. It was because the effect of our relationship on his family overwhelmed him.”

“How would he have reacted to the baby?”

Juli looked down. “I’ve imagined it a thousand different ways, selfish ways with Mihaly deserting me, or blaming me.”

“Do you think he would have blamed you?”

“No. I imagined it because I thought it would be easier to say good-bye. I was going to tell him about the baby Friday on the bus.

But he was worried about the reactor. Instead of telling him, I kept it from him and … we argued. The same argument. One of us saying we must end it. The other softening. Back and forth …”

Juli folded her hands in her lap and looked up at him. “Technology rules our lives. We act like the machines. All this damned logic when nothing is really logical. Bringing children into the world, keeping them healthy, giving them moments of happiness along the way. And after they’ve grown up, happiness disappears.”

When Aunt Magda brought plum brandy, Juli went into the kitchen for water instead. Back on the sofa, when Juli looked at him above her water glass, Lazlo saw the emotions of a woman. He was reminded of Nina sipping wine at dinner last winter in Pripyat. He was reminded of Tamara’s eyes glowing in candlelight at Club Ukrainka. He saw in Juli’s eyes a sadness he had seen in his mother’s eyes when she was alive.

“I wonder,” said Juli, “if the KGB knows what Mihaly told me.”

“You mean the test on the reactor?”

“Yes. What if the chief engineer was knowingly doing something dangerous? Mihaly said the plant might be a guinea pig. The chief engineer wasn’t there. Why wouldn’t he be there when the experiment was his idea?”

Lazlo did not answer. An experiment; Mihaly, the scapegoat.

Would they blame it on error or laziness? Would they accuse Juli of seducing Mihaly, causing emotional upset in his life? And what about Cousin Zukor last summer at the farm? Lazlo mistrusted Zukor and had the feeling his questioning of Mihaly about Chernobyl might turn up again.

Juli’s eyes, reflecting light from the front window, did not blink.

Lazlo wondered if he was performing an experiment. Staring into this woman’s eyes to see how it would affect her, or him. His chest felt suddenly smaller in size, breathless, his thoughts veering away from the logical path of investigation.

Before considering the consequences, Lazlo leaned forward and kissed her. And she kissed him. They did not embrace. They did not close their eyes. When he withdrew, he expected a reaction, a comment. Instead, Juli sipped her water and began speaking again as if nothing had happened.

“When I was a girl, my father took me skating in Gorky Park.

His friends were there, and he’d tell them about my schoolwork. I remember being embarrassed. When I was older, he wanted me to go to medical school. ‘A career based on compassion, perfect for a woman,’ he said. I should have followed his advice. If I’d become a doctor, none of this would have happened. I would have been in Moscow. And at Chernobyl, Mihaly’s boss, compassionate and aware of Mihaly’s family, would not have put him in charge during the experiment.”

When Aunt Magda returned with brandy to refill Lazlo’s glass, he declined because soon he was due back at the roadblock. Juli had turned, her knees pressing against his leg. The house was warm.

The brandy made him even warmer. And now this woman carrying his brother’s child immersed him in womblike warmth. He wanted to kiss her again. He wanted to hold her. He wanted the rest of the world to go away for at least this brief time before the devil named duty called him back to the cold world.

Although Lazlo reminded her of Mihaly, he was not Mihaly. Lazlo was a man of his own making, sensitive and honorable, but with a mysterious past. A man filled with melancholy. She felt it deep inside when he kissed her. A man so alone, so wanting to encompass her life. How could he do this? How could he fall in love with her now? And why did she want so much to embrace him? Insane! Mihaly dead, and now his brother sits so close, so close.

Juli recalled the photograph she’d seen in Mihaly’s apartment.

Lazlo in the wedding party, smiling with pride. Lazlo looking so much like Mihaly, but also looking like her father. A man brought to her by fate, speaking about a wine cellar on the farm where he and Mihaly grew up.

“We spent a lot of time in the wine cellar last summer. Down there we could go back in time. If we stuck our heads up out of the hole, we’d see our mother in the yard hanging laundry. When the wine began to flow, we confessed our sins. Because we were brothers, because we trusted one another, the confessions were more revealing than those to a priest.”

Lazlo turned to the window, the resemblance of his profile to Mihaly’s profile making her shudder. He turned back to her. “What Mihaly told me in the wine cellar might account for both of us being followed. He said there were serious problems at Chernobyl. He worked in the control room. He was around the reactor all the time.

He saw what went on.”

“So did others,” said Juli. “The so-called ‘disregard for safety’

at the plant generated jokes. It was a way of coping. Officials disciplined anyone who spoke openly. Some were sent away to psychiatric hospitals.”

“Initially Mihaly said he would resign because of the probability of an accident. Later he said he’d mentioned problems at Chernobyl to avoid telling me about you.”

“But he did tell you about me.”

“He told me. I hadn’t even met you and I hated you.”

“Do you hate me now?”

Lazlo put his hand on her knee, leaned close, and whispered,

“How could I?”

The KGB had more aggressive methods than monitoring correspondence and telephone conversations when it came to keeping track of suspected anti-Soviets. Most common was direct observation, noting movements and contacts.