Page 470 of Edge of Eternity (The Century 3)

Jasper flew into Budapest in a January blizzard. Beside the Danube, snow lay thick on the neo-Gothic turrets of the vast parliament building. It was in that building that Jasper met Miklos Nemeth.

Jasper had got the interview with the help of Rebecca Held. Although he had not previously met her, he knew about her from Dave Williams and Walli Franck. As soon as he got to Bonn he had looked her up: she was the nearest thing he had to a German contact. She was now an important figure in the German Foreign Office.

Even better, she was a friend--perhaps a lover, Jasper guessed--of Frederik Biro, aide to Miklos Nemeth. Biro had fixed up the interview.

It was Biro who now met Jasper in the lobby and escorted him through a maze of corridors and passageways to the office of the prime minister.

Nemeth was just forty-one. He was a short man with thick brown hair that fell over his forehead in a kiss curl. His face showed intelligence and determination, but also anxiety. For the interview he sat behind an oak table and nervously surrounded himself with aides. No doubt he was vividly aware that he was speaking not just to Jasper, but to the United States government--and that Moscow would be watching, too.

Like any prime minister, he talked mostly in predictable cliches. There would be hard times ahead, but the country would emerge stronger in the long run. And yadda yadda yadda, thought Jasper. He needed something better than this.

He asked whether the new political "clubs" could ever become free political parties.

Nemeth gave Jasper a hard, direct look, and said in a firm, clear voice: "That is one of our greatest ambitions."

Jasper concealed his astonishment. No Iron Curtain country had ever had independent political parties. Did Nemeth really mean it?

Jasper asked whether the Communist Party would ever give up its "leading role" in Hungarian society.

Nemeth gave him that look again. "In two years I could imagine that the head of government might not be a Politburo member," he said.

Jasper had to stop himself saying Jesus Christ!

He was on a roll, and it was time for the big one. "Might the Soviets intervene to stop these changes, as they did in 1956?"

Nemeth gave him the look for the third time. "Gorbachev has taken the lid off a boiling pot," he said, slowly and distinctly. Then he added: "The steam may be painful, but change is irreversible."

And Jasper knew he had his first great story from Europe.

*

A few days later he watched a videotape of his report as it had appeared on American television. Rebecca sat beside him, a poised, confident woman in her fifties, friendly but with an air of authority. "Yes, I think Nemeth means every word," she said in answer to Jasper's question.

Jasper had ended the report speaking to camera in front of the parliament building, with snowflakes landing in his hair. "The ground is frozen hard here in this Eastern European country," he said on the screen. "But, as always, the seeds of spring are stirring underground. Clearly the Hungarian people want change. But will their Moscow overlords permit it? Miklos Nemeth believes there is a new mood of tolerance in the Kremlin. Only time will tell whether he is right."

That had been Jasper's sign-off, but now to his surprise he saw that another clip had been added to his piece. A spokesman for James Baker, secretary of state to newly inaugurated President George H. W. Bush, spoke to an invisible interviewer. "Signs of softening in Communist attitudes are not to be trusted," the spokesman said. "The Soviets are attempting to lull the United States into a false sense of security. There is no reason to doubt the Kremlin's willingness to intervene in Eastern Europe the minute they feel threatened. The urgent necessity now is to underscore the credibility of NATO's nuclear deterrent."

"Good God," said Rebecca. "What planet are they on?"

*

Tanya Dvorkin returned to Warsaw in February 1989.

She was sorry to leave Vasili on his own in Moscow, mainly because she would miss him, but also because she still nursed a faint anxiety that he would fill the apartment with nubile teenagers. She did not really believe it would happen. Those days were over. All the same the worry nagged at her a little.

However, Warsaw was a great assignment. Poland was in a ferment. Solidarity had somehow risen from its grave. Amazingly, General Jaruzelski--the dictator who had cracked down on freedom only seven years previously, breaking every promise and stamping on the independent trade union--had in desperation agreed to round-table talks with opposition groups.

In Tanya's opinion, Jaruzelski had not changed--the Kremlin had. Jaruzelski was the same old tyrant, but he was no longer confident of Soviet support. According to Dimka, Jaruzelski had been told that Poland must solve its own problems, without help from Moscow. When Mikhail Gorbachev first said this, Jaruzelski had not believed it. None of the East European leaders had. But that had been three years ago, and at last the message was beginning to sink in.

Tanya did not know what would happen. No one did. Never in her life had she heard so much talk of change, liberalization, and freedom. But the Communists were still in control in the Soviet bloc. Was the day coming nearer when she and Vasili could reveal their secret, and tell the world the true identity of the author Ivan Kuznetsov? In the past such hopes had always ended up crushed beneath the caterpillar tracks of Soviet tanks.

As soon as Tanya arrived in Warsaw, she was invited to dinner at the apartment of Danuta Gorski.

Standing at the door, ringing the bell, she remembered the last time she had seen Danuta, being dragged out of this very apartment by the brutish ZOMO security police in their camouflage uniforms, on the night seven years ago when Jaruzelski had declared martial law.

Now Danuta opened the door, grinning broadly, all teeth and hair. She hugged Tanya, then led her into the dining room of the small apartment. Her husband, Marek, was opening a bottle of Hungarian Riesling, and there was a plate of snack-size sausages on the table with a small dish of mustard.

"I was in jail for eighteen days," Danuta said. "I think they let me out because I was radicalizing the other inmates." She laughed, throwing back her head.

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