Belly of the Beast (17 page)

“I’ve been through many changes,” said Maria, “Stalin’s purges, Khrushchev’s cold war, Glasnost, Perestroika, and now Dissolution. None made a difference.” Maria looked at Pytor. “When Dr. Irina came here, I believed that she was trying to help. She had the most beautiful hair. Did she dye it?”

“No. At least I don’t think so,” answered Pytor.

“Of course not. You can’t trust someone with dyed hair. I trusted Dr. Irina, but after she visited me, my pension checks began arriving late.”

“Everyone’s pension’s checks are erratic these days,” said Pytor.

“My point exactly. As you said, everyone is talking.” Maria put a silver samovar on the table.

“Did you know Svetlana Mikhailovna Trepova?” Niki asked again.

Maria raised her eyebrows as she poured hot water into the samovar. “I already told you my answer.”

“Perhaps you could just tell us how to contact the action committee.”

“You talk about a committee you don’t even know about?”

“My mother was a translator,” said Niki. “Perhaps you could direct us to a friend of yours who might have known her.”

“It is not wise to make friends. Pity you do not have time for tea.” Maria left the samovar, picked up the cold fish and looked in each of its sunken eyes.

“What about a man named Joseph Hauser? He lived in Techa.”

“Hauser. A German name. A prisoner? They tore the Techa barracks down years ago.”

“But did you know him?”

“We were not allowed to talk to people from Techa.” Maria turned away, touched the fish to her lips, and seemed to kiss it.

“Well, thank you,” said Pytor. “Sorry to bother you, and I’m sorry our country made you work here.”

“How dare you insinuate such a thing? I volunteered. I defended the Motherland. Any of us would do it all again—unless one of us was a traitor.” Her eyes bore into Niki’s.

Snow fell as Pytor and Niki got back in the Zhuguli.

“I don’t know what I was thinking,” said Niki as they drove to another house. “I thought the village would be tiny, or they’d have telephone books, or something. She knew, didn’t she?”

“Perhaps,” answered Pytor. “She seemed stressed by your accent.”

“She was stressed by your name.”

“Sorry. I didn’t handle things very well. Kolchak is a difficult name for most, sort of like Hitler. My great grandfather was head of the White Army in the Urals. It’s surprising my father was allowed into the KGB.”

“He told me he had never worked at Mayak. What’s he hiding?”

Pytor shrugged. “He’s a deceitful man. I suppose it was his job, but I hate him for it. Seems Maria did too. She won’t be any help.”

“She was strange.”

“And content with leaving things as they are.” Pytor glanced over his shoulder. “The fish don’t smell anymore.”

“We become habituated to most everything,” said Niki.

Pytor tried two more cottages, but no one would talk. Snow fell harder.

Niki sighed. “I carried a stupid syringe halfway around the world thinking I would find my father and collect bone marrow like one would pick up a tomato at the supermarket. I’m so stupid.”

The windshield wipers slapped back and forth. Pytor reached over and touched Niki’s hand.

“You’re not stupid. I suppose an outsider could never imagine how different Russia really is. We don’t have what you just said, super market. Let’s get rid of the fish, then we’ll decide what to do. We can’t afford to get snowed in.”

“If Joseph came back, he might have left a note in that tunnel,” said Niki staring straight ahead.

Pytor shook his head with the sweep of the wipers. “Don’t even think about it.”

“Think about what?” asked Niki. “If Joseph left a note?”

“Don’t think about trying to find the tunnel. We pressed our luck just driving to Tatysh,” Pytor said as he stopped in front of the produce warehouse.

“I’m ready to grab at straws.”

“The checkpoint officers you saw were puppy dogs compared to the pit bulls we’d see on the Mayak perimeter. We’d both be dead within a hundred meters of the first wall.”

“You’re the one who wanted to get medical records two days ago.”

Pytor got out of the car. “The medical offices aren’t in the main compound, but even getting them is a stupid pipe dream.” He slammed the door. A fish tumbled from the stack.

Pytor turned back and opened the door. “I’m sorry, Niki. People are dying and I know why, but I can’t prove it to anyone who matters. I don’t mean to take out my frustrations on you.”

“I understand. I can’t ask you to do more than you have. It’s not your fault I failed. You need to get back to Katrina.” A tear slid down Niki’s face. “I should have listened to Rob; I should have listed to your father; I should have listened to Dr.—”

The warehouse door swung open.

“Shush, we’ll have to talk later. Don’t say a word.”

Pytor drove inside. A well-fed man with orange peel skin peered through the window.

“Fish! You were supposed to bring eggs!”

Pytor got out and stood by his snow covered car. “There was a change.”

“I won’t pay you for fish, I sell produce.”

“These are pink salmon from the east. They grew up in clean water if you know what I mean.”

“People here like Lake Artyash fish.”

“I suppose it tastes like normal fish.”

“It is normal fish. If there was something wrong with our fish, the government would tell us.”

“To suggest otherwise would be treason,” said Pytor. “Of course your fish are normal.”

The warehouse man hesitated. “How much for
your
normal fish?”

“Fifteen rubles a kilo.”

“For frozen fish? Robbery.”

“Pink salmon. You can slice it and eat it frozen. The warehouse man in Sverdlovsk thought you could double your money. The smell alone will draw in customers. All you have to do is have the same conversation we just had about Lake Artyash fish. You’re smarter than me. Maybe you could triple your money.”

“I don’t know.” The man scratched his bumpy chin.

“Okay,” said Pytor. “I don’t want to haul back any fish. Thirteen rubles a kilo in cash and four bottles of vodka. I’m a little low on antifreeze if you know what I mean.”

“Tell you what. My partner must be sick, didn’t even open up this morning. You take his milk run, and I’ll take the fish at eleven rubles.”

Pytor hesitated.

“I’ll throw in the antifreeze. The milk run won’t take long. I’ll unload your car while you’re gone and you can be out of here before the worst of the storm hits. Deliver the milk or take the fish back with you.”

“I don’t have much choice,” said Pytor.

 “Who’s the woman?” asked the man.

“My wife.”

“Your papers in order?”

“Yes, of course.”

The man nodded toward Niki. “She doesn’t talk much.”

“Ah, she’s a deaf-mute. She just sits and cries a lot.”

“Lucky bastard. I wish my wife was a deaf-mute.”

Pytor chuckled politely.

“You sure your papers are in order?”

“Of course. Where are the papers for the truck?”

The man took a quick look. “My partner must have them, but don’t worry, I’ll send you the back way. There’s only one checkpoint and they don’t man it during the day.”

“Where are we going?”

“Take the old service road just past the Tatysh railroad crossing. Follow it to some old buildings on the other side of a dry lake. A guard at an iron gate will tell you where to go from there.”

Snow cut visibility to less than a mile. Cold air poured in through the rusted out panels of the old PAZ milk truck. Niki put her numb feet on her leather satchel.

“This is the way back to Tatysh,” she said as she peered ahead.

“Sorry, but we’ve got to deliver some stuff so I can get gas money. We turn off just before the village.”

Niki closed her eyes. “We’ll never know how close we were.”

“I feel terrible,” said Pytor. “I know I’ve given you false hope, then let you down, but I don’t know where else to look.”

“I’m not blaming you.”

Just before the turn to Tatysh, Pytor drove across a railroad track, then turned onto a gravel road that was almost obscured by the snow. After three or four kilometers, Pytor and Niki drove through an open gate in a tall fence, turned left to follow a railroad track a short ways, then drove through another unmanned gate. The road dropped down into a dry lake bed at least a kilometer across.

Pytor stopped and got out his dosimeter. “I want to go out and take a quick reading.” Before opening the door, Pytor removed the tape on the switch. The dosimeter shrieked to life.

“Holy shit.” Pytor turned a knob. “It’s off scale on every setting.” He passed the screaming dosimeter to Niki, put the truck in gear, and stepped on the gas.

Niki re-taped the switch. “That was bad?”

Pytor nodded. “We must be crossing what’s left of Lake Karachay. We’d be dead in a few hours if we stayed here ten minutes.”

“Lake Karachay,” said Niki, “site of the second worst nuclear accident.”

“No wonder there weren’t any guards.”

Half a kilometer past the end of the lake, a massive smoke stack forced its way into the belly of a pregnant snow cloud. A massive concrete wall blocked the road. Pytor slowed down.

Niki handed back the dosimeter. “Where are we?”

Pytor tucked the dosimeter in his breast pocket. “I think we are near some back entrance to Mayak. The warehouse man said there’d be an iron gate.”

Niki pointed ahead. “There it is. The road jogs to the left again. We’re actually going into Mayak.”

“Perhaps,” said Pytor as he approached a guard house. “You’re Canadian again, English only.”

“The Canadian scientist arrives in a milk truck at back door to Mayak because—”

“Hush,” said Pytor. “I’m trying to figure that out. Act first, think later. It’s a Russian tradition.” At the last minute he announced, “You’re not Canadian. Hide your passport. You’re a deaf-mute again.

A white-haired guard walked over to the truck. “Where’s Vanya?”

“Sick.”

“Never seen you before.”

“I deliver vegetables from Sverdlovsk. I’m just helping out this once.”

“Takes two of you? Smells fishy.”

“Right, sometimes I must take my wife, retarded, needs constant care, eats a lot of fish. I’ve got to drop off this load of milk and produce and get her back to Sverdlovsk before the storm gets worse.”

“She dresses well.”

“I dress her. Having her looking good is all I’ve got, if you know what I mean. Do you think it’s easy living with someone like her? She probably didn’t get enough milk as a child.”

Niki let a little spit drool down her chin.

“Milk is good,” said the guard, “washes out the strontium or something. Let’s see your papers.”

Pytor handed over the delivery papers and his passport.

The guard looked at the passport, then at Pytor. “Kolchak. Pytor
Yurievich
Kolchak?”

Pytor nodded.

“Your father was Yuri Kirillovich Kolchak?”

Pytor nodded again, his eyes wide.

“I used to work in Group of Reactors A. He was the political officer.”

“I didn’t know where he worked,” said Pytor.

“He exiled me and my wife to Magadan. I hated him.”

“I did too,” said Pytor.

“She was six months pregnant.”

“Bastard.”

“They called him the vampire.” The white-haired man looked over his shoulder, then whispered. “But Yuri Kirillovich saved our lives. He knew the dangers of radiation more than we, and he got us out. We were confined to Magadan, but your father was a good man.”

“Ah, ah, yes, I grew to appreciate him, too.”

“But my wife and son eventually died of the cold.” He handed back the papers. “You can’t go in here. You don’t have the truck papers, and there’s nothing for that wife of yours. Tell your father that Borya Borisavich says thank you.”

“Ah, okay. What am I going to do with this produce? I’ve got ripe peaches from Greece, and of course the milk fresh from the cows. They’ll freeze if we don’t get them inside.”

“You’ve got peaches?” asked Borya.

Pytor nodded. “Flown in from Turkey yesterday. You’ll eat better than Boris Yeltsin.”

Borya looked around. “I don’t know why we have a gate anymore. Even the ghosts left this place years ago. Pull inside and wait by the next gate. I’ll be on my dinner break in five minutes. I’ll escort you.”

The second gate was open and unattended. Pytor stopped short of it.

“What do you think Borya meant by
the vampire
?” whispered Niki.

“I don’t like to think about it, but the name seems reason enough for Maria not to trust me. Everything is such a big goddamned secret here, and no one cares who dies because of it.”

“It sounds like your father tried to help some people.”

“Perhaps, but he didn’t leave a smooth path for me to follow.”

The windshield wipers took a swipe at the snow. Ahead, a few people moved like spirits from one unmarked building to another. There were no street signs, no names on the buildings, no numbers.

 “This place is deserted,” said Pytor. “I wonder if it was plant B.”

“Where the tunnel is.” Niki whispered back. “My god, could we be that close?”

“It’s just a guess,” said Pytor. “Funny, I wanted to get into Mayak. If this is it, I just want to get out. I’m worried about Katrina.”

The right windshield wiper squealed, struggled to the top of its arc, then died. Pytor looked in the rear-view mirror. Beyond the truck’s blue exhaust, Borya was closing the first gate.

“I’m worried about Katrina too,” said Niki, “but if the tunnel is –”

 “Quiet,” said Pytor.

Borya tapped on Niki’s window. Niki’s heart jumped, but she acted like she hadn’t heard a thing. Borya opened the door and squeezed in next to her in the small cab. Pytor started driving. Within ten seconds, the window in front of Niki covered over with snow. Pressed between the two men and unable to see, Niki’s claustrophobia kicked into high gear. Eyes closed, she tried to
will
herself out of the truck.

 “I could not have helped you a few years ago,” said Borya. “Turn left here.”

Pytor turned.

“Security was tighter here than anywhere else in Russia,” Borya continued. “A single gram of pure plutonium was worth a thousand kilograms of gold, and it ran in pipes right below us. Turn right.”

Pytor leaned forward to see Borya’s face. “This was the plutonium finishing plant, Plant B?”

“How did you know that?” asked Borya.

“Uh, the warehouse man mentioned it.”

“People talk too much. Pull over here. This is the cafeteria.”

“We couldn’t have found it without you,” said Pytor. “There are no signs.”

“Signs are just directions for the enemy.”

“It’s not clear who that is anymore,” said Pytor. “Times are changing.”

“Not here. Some young guard tried to take my post today, but he didn’t have the right paperwork. I sent him home. The old rules still apply at Mayak. Take the milk through that steel door; the kitchen is to the right. Milk in the cooler, peaches on the counter. I’ll be in the cafeteria down the hall, but don’t come in. Wait here until I get back. Understand?”

Pytor nodded.

Once Borya was out of sight, Pytor whispered, “This was Plant B for sure.”

“My mother and father were here,” Niki whispered back. “Now it’s deserted.”

 “A new production plant replaced plant B twenty years ago. It looks like there are just a few guards and some maintenance people here.”

 “Maybe we can find the tunnel.”

“Not likely, but I’ll try to stall for some time. Quiet now, and help me unload.”

After three trips to the kitchen, Pytor paused to take a dosimeter reading. “Eighteen microsieverts per hour. Less than in the village.” He nodded toward the base of the smoke stack they had seen from the outside. “Mole said that used to be the tallest structure in Russia. He said they used to release radioactive waste and nitric acid fumes as high as they could so the wind would carry it someplace else. It was a nostril of the beast.”

“I need to find the belly.”

The short day faded as Pytor and Niki finished unloading crates of milk and boxes of produce. A few outdoor lights popped on. Borya returned from his dinner wiping milk from his mouth.

“I noticed some boxes of Swiss chocolate,” said Pytor. “Nobody gets Swiss chocolate.”

“We do,” said Borya. “In the old days we were called the chocolate eaters—small compensation for what we were exposed to. Most of the workers died here, and those who survived only got to go to Magadan.”

“Why did you come back?”                                         

“I like chocolate.”

Pytor shook the snow from his head and loaded a crate of empty bottles. Borya stared at him.

“You’ve got fresh grease on your arm.”

Pytor wiped his sleeve on his pants. “Vanya’s partner asked me to check the oil before I returned.”

“It does smoke a lot. Get in; I need to get back to my gate. Niki wiped her side of the windshield before she climbed in.

Pytor pushed the starter button. The old truck sputtered and coughed, backfired, and died.

“I’ll have to look at the engine,” said Pytor. “I probably knocked a wire loose when I checked the oil. You can go on ahead, I’ll follow our tracks back.”

“Equipment is always breaking down,” said Borya. “I’ll call for a truck to tow you out.”

“No need. I should have it going in a few minutes.”

Pytor opened the engine cover as Borya walked away, his footsteps muffled by the new snow.

“I pulled off the ignition wires to buy us some time,” whispered Pytor, “but I don’t know what to do now. Do you think—”

A light shone over Pytor’s shoulder. He jumped, banging his head on the engine cover.

“Ah,” said Borya, “I thought you might need a light.” He turned the light on the engine. “Those ignition wires are off. Put them on, and I’ll take you back to the gate.”

Back in the truck, Niki was squashed in the middle again. Pytor leaned forward to see Borya. “Could you give us a tour, show me where my father worked?”

“This is not an amusement park,” said Borya. He nodded toward Niki. “She doesn’t say much, this retarded wife of yours.”

“She’s a deaf-mute too.”

“Do you always talk to deaf-mutes when your engine doesn’t start?”

“I was talking to myself. I talk to my cat too.”

Borya put his hand on his side arm. “I’ll have a look at
her
papers now.”

Niki followed an instinct. “I’m Latvian,” she said turning as best she could to face Borya. “My accent embarrasses my husband. My son is dying. I came with Pytor to find my father. He’s the only one who—”

“Show me your papers!”

Niki hesitated.

“In my right hand,” Borya said calmly, “is a nine millimeter Glock. One shot will go through both of you.”

Like an avalanche on a barren slope, adrenaline raced through Niki’s body. “I’m really Canadian,” she blurted.

“Quiet!”

By the light of a small orange flashlight, Borya studied Niki’s passport and visa. “Michaels. That sounds very American. You are a CIA scientist here to steal our secrets?”