Page 412 of Edge of Eternity (The Century 3)

Tanya said: "Gaining the approval of both sides is unusual."

"He's an unusual man. Enjoy your party."

The do was held in the utilitarian offices of the writers' union, but they had managed to get hold of several cases of Bagrationi, the Georgian champagne. Under its influence, Tanya got into an argument with Pyotr Opotkin, from TASS. No one liked Opotkin, who was not a

journalist but a political supervisor, but he had to be invited to social events because he was too powerful to offend. He buttonholed Tanya and said accusingly: "The Pope's visit to Warsaw is a catastrophe!"

Opotkin was right about that. No one had imagined how it would be. Pope John Paul II turned out to be a talented propagandist. When he got off the plane at Okecie military airport he fell to his knees and kissed the Polish ground. The picture was on the front pages of the Western press next morning, and Tanya knew--as the Pope must have known--that the image would find its way back into Poland by underground routes. Tanya secretly rejoiced.

Daniil, Tanya's boss, was listening, and he interjected: "Driving into Warsaw in an open car, the Pope was cheered by two million people."

Tanya said: "Two million?" She had not seen this statistic. "Is that possible? It must be something like five percent of the entire population--one in every twenty Poles!"

Opotkin said angrily: "What is the point of the party controlling television coverage when people can see the Pope for themselves?"

Control was everything for men such as Opotkin.

He was not done. "He celebrated mass in Victory Square in the presence of two hundred and fifty thousand people!"

Tanya knew that. It was a shocking figure, even to her, for it starkly revealed the extent to which Communism had failed to win the hearts of the Polish people. Thirty-five years of life under the Soviet system had converted nobody but the privileged elite. She made the point in appropriate Communist jargon. "The Polish working class reasserted their reactionary old loyalties at the first opportunity."

Poking Tanya's shoulder with an accusing forefinger, Opotkin said: "It was reformists like you who insisted on letting the Pope go there."

"Rubbish," said Tanya scornfully. Kremlin liberals such as Dimka had urged letting the Pope in, but they had lost the argument, and Moscow had told Warsaw to ban the Pope--but the Polish Communists had disobeyed orders. In a display of independence unusual for a Soviet satellite, the Polish leader Edward Gierek had defied Brezhnev. "It was the Polish leadership that made the decision," Tanya said. "They feared there would be an uprising if they forbade the Pope's visit."

"We know how to deal with uprisings," said Opotkin.

Tanya knew she was only damaging her career by contradicting Opotkin, but she was forty and sick of kowtowing to idiots. "Financial pressures made the Polish decision inevitable," she said. "Poland gets huge subsidies from us, but it needs loans from the West as well. President Carter was very tough when he went to Warsaw. He made it clear that financial aid was linked to what they call human rights. If you want to blame someone for the Pope's triumph, Jimmy Carter is the culprit."

Opotkin must have known this was true, but he was not going to admit it. "I always said it was a mistake to let Communist countries borrow from Western banks."

Tanya should have left it there, and allowed Opotkin to save face, but she could not restrain herself. "Then you face a dilemma, don't you?" she said. "The alternative to Western finance is to liberalize Polish agriculture so that they can produce enough of their own food."

"More reforms!" Opotkin said angrily. "That is always your solution!"

"The Polish people have always had cheap food: that's what keeps them quiet. Whenever the government puts up prices, they riot."

"We know how to deal with riots," said Opotkin, and he walked away.

Daniil looked bemused. "Good for you," he said to Tanya. "Though he may make you pay."

Tanya said: "I want some more of that champagne."

At the bar she ran into Vasili. He was alone. Tanya realized that lately he had been showing up to events like this without a floozie on his arm, and she wondered why. But she was focused on herself tonight. "I can't do this much longer," she said.

Vasili handed her a glass. "Do what?"

"You know."

"I suppose I can guess."

"I'm forty. I have to live my own life."

"What do you want to do?"

"I don't know, that's the trouble."

"I'm forty-eight," he said. "And I feel something similar."

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