Page 438 of Edge of Eternity (The Century 3)

"He knows about cows, does he?"

Opotkin thrust a piece of paper at her. "We're going to have to publish a retraction."

Tanya took it from him but did not read it. "Why are you so concerned to defend people who are destroying our country?"

"We cannot undermine Communist Party cadres!"

The phone on Tanya's desk rang, and she picked it up. "Tanya Dvorkin."

A vaguely familiar voice said: "You wrote

the article about cows dying in Vladimir."

Tanya sighed. "Yes, I did, and I have already been reprimanded. Who is this calling?"

"I am the secretary responsible for agriculture. My name is Mikhail Gorbachev. You interviewed me in 1976."

"So I did." Gorbachev was obviously going to add his condemnation to Opotkin's, Tanya assumed.

Gorbachev said: "I called to congratulate you on your excellent analysis."

Tanya was astonished. "I . . . uh, thank you, comrade!"

"It is desperately important that we eliminate such inefficiency on our farms."

"Uh, comrade Secretary, would you mind saying that to my editor in chief? We were just discussing the article, and he was talking of a retraction."

"Retraction? Rubbish. Put him on the phone."

Grinning, Tanya said to Opotkin: "Secretary Gorbachev would like to talk to you."

At first Opotkin did not believe her. He took the phone and said: "To whom am I speaking, please?"

From then on he was silent but for the occasional: "Yes, comrade."

At last he put down the phone. He walked away without speaking to Tanya.

It gave her profound satisfaction to crumple the retraction and toss it into the bin.

She went to Vasili's apartment not knowing what to expect. She hoped he was not going to ask her to join his harem. Just in case, she was wearing unsexy serge trousers and a drab gray sweater, to discourage him. All the same, she found herself looking forward to the evening.

He opened the door wearing a blue sweater and a white shirt, both new-looking. She kissed his cheek, then studied him. His hair was gray, now, but still luxuriant and wavy. At fifty he was upright and slim.

He opened a bottle of Georgian champagne and put snacks on the table, squares of toast with egg salad and tomato, and fish roes on cucumber. Tanya wondered who had made them. It would not be beyond him to have one of his girlfriends do it.

The apartment was comfortable, full of books and pictures. Vasili had a tape deck that played cassettes. He was affluent now, even without the fortune in foreign royalties that he could not receive.

He wanted to know all about Poland. How had the Kremlin defeated Solidarity without an invasion? Why had Jaruzelski betrayed the Polish people? He did not think his apartment was bugged, but he played a Tchaikovsky cassette just in case.

Tanya told him that Solidarity was not dead. It had gone underground. Many of the men arrested under martial law were still in jail, but the sexist secret police had failed to appreciate the major role played by women. Almost all the female organizers were still at large, including Danuta, who had been arrested, then released. She was again working undercover, producing illegal newspapers and pamphlets, rebuilding lines of communication.

All the same, Tanya had no hope. If they rebelled again, they would be crushed again. Vasili was more optimistic. "It was a near thing," he said. "In half a century, no one has come so close to defeating Communism."

This was like the old days, Tanya thought, feeling comfortable as the champagne relaxed her. Back in the early sixties, before Vasili was jailed, they had often sat around like this, talking and arguing about politics and literature and art.

She told him about the phone call from Mikhail Gorbachev. "He's an odd one," Vasili said. "We in the agriculture ministry see a lot of him. He's Yuri Andropov's pet, and he seems to be a rock-solid Communist. His wife is even worse. Yet he backs reformist ideas, whenever he can do it without offending his superiors."

"My brother thinks highly of him."

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