The Amber Room (37 page)

She pushed open a door at the end of the hall. “And here you see exposed the wound to my nation's heart.”

The ward held a number of tiny cribs and glass-covered incubators. Dr. Sova marched purposefully toward one, unaware of the difficulty Jeffrey and Katya had in following her. When the incubator's occupant came into view, Jeffrey felt the air punched from his chest. Katya responded with a very small cry.

“This baby is now in her thirtieth week,” Dr. Sova said, the professional briskness unable to hide her concern for her tiny charge. “With premature births we count from gestation, as you do in the West. This is now what we call an old lady, because she has survived the first critical ten days, and her weight is up over three pounds.”

“She's so small,” Jeffrey whispered.

Dr. Sova's smile was tinged with sadness. “This is a very big baby. Very healthy. She's almost ready to go home. We have many premature births with weights at seven hundred grams, or about one and one-half pounds. Those are the ones who cause us the greatest worry.”

The baby was more than tiny. She was so small as to appear incapable of life. A rib cage smaller than his fist. A head that could have fit within the palm of his hand. Incredibly fragile arms and legs and hands and feet, like the limbs of a tiny china doll.

“The problem is not just one of survival,” Dr. Sova went on. “The problem is the
quality
of survival. Cerebral palsy. Blindness. Mental ability. All of these are unanswered questions with premature babies at this stage of their development.”

Wires and needles were taped to the baby's head and abdomen and wrist and ankle. A tiny tube was taped inside her nostril. Monitors standing on a bedside table and hung from the wall hummed and beeped and drew electronic pulses.

“Today, one in five babies born in this region are premature.
In the West, the rate is less than one in twenty. Here, placentas are affected by air and water quality—this is now documented fact.”

She placed a hand on the thick plastic incubator cover and stroked it, as though touching the baby within. “We are still using incubators that are extremely loud for the baby—their ears are very sensitive at this stage. Some of those from Russia, the only ones we can afford, risk cooking the child because the temperature inside is not always the same as what is registered on the thermometer. We need new ones that both monitor the child's safety and let it grow healthily through this dangerous period.

“Some of my patients who were preemies like this one are now children of seven or eight years of age. I've watched them grow, and I love them as my own. I want to give all these children not just the gift of life, but the gift of a
quality
life. If they wish to be violinists, I want to be sure that their ears are intact and their muscle coordination is precise enough to allow them to play as a virtuoso.”

“You need new incubators,” Katya said.

“We need
everything
,” Dr. Sova replied. “Our financial problems are crippling. We hold our doctors' salaries to two hundred dollars a month and pray that they will not be stolen away by offers from the West at twenty times that amount. With the government's finances in such disarray, we find our budgets being cut daily, while everything we require grows steadily more expensive. Light, coal, repairs to buildings and equipment—every week we wonder if next week we shall have enough to do what is required. One day we lack needles, the next syringes, another day something else, but up to now we have lost no child because of our lack. Of this we are very, very proud.”

Dr. Sova guided them around the ward and its tiny occupants. Everywhere were signs of a world far removed from the wealth of the West. The cribs were prewar metal types, heavy and painted white and sided with bars that rose and
lowered with screeched protests. The bed sheets all bore hand-stitched repair jobs, as did most of the blankets Jeffrey saw. Machines and wirings wore heavy bandages of silver tape. In the corner station, two nurses were using their break time to crochet miniature bonnets and booties for their patients.

“Basically we need to outfit an entire new ward,” Dr. Sova explained. “We need Western-type incubators, which will ensure a stable environment for our little ones. IV pumps, monitors, X-ray machine, lung ventilator and compressor—all of these are desperately required.”

As she walked them back down the hall toward the main entrance, Dr. Sova told them, “Across the border in East Germany, before the Wall fell, they had a policy very different from ours. We heard it from doctors we met in conferences. In their heavily polluted cities, all babies weighing less than a kilo were drowned at birth. The authorities decided to spend their scarce resources on patients with a better chance of survival, you see. We have struggled with the problem in a different way, but so long as the culprit remains, so long as pollution levels continue to climb, such horrors are a real possibility in poorer lands.”

She pushed open the doors, shook hands, smiled them out and away from the problems locked within those doors. “Poland has never faced so great a threat as it does now from air and water pollution,” Dr. Sova said. “This I believe with all my heart. The future of this very generation—the one being born today, not several decades from now, but today—lies in the balance.”

CHAPTER 36

“It's the Amber Room,” Jeffrey announced to Alexander the next evening by telephone. He made no effort to mask his own excitement. “Rokovski is absolutely certain.”

“And, no doubt, most ecstatic.”

“He did everything but climb the walls while we were with him,” Jeffrey confirmed. “He's had three top experts examine the stuff. They've found tracings of old ink on the tissue around each piece.”

“Instructions for fitting the puzzle back together.”

“That's what they think,” Jeffrey agreed. “And he says there is no doubt whatsoever that the amber fits the descriptions of old documents.”

“They haven't made their find public in this search for authentication, I hope.”

“Not on your life.”

“That is good. If this truly is the Amber Room, two million dollars is a paltry sum to pay.”

“Not for them,” Jeffrey replied. “Rokovski is frantic with worry over how to gather together that much money without going to the central authorities and running the risk of word getting out.”

Alexander was silent a long moment, then, “And he is certain that the carvings are not forgeries?”

“Rokovski estimates the suitcases' contents alone are worth over a third of what they've requested,” Jeffrey replied. “He said the carvings are exquisite. That was his word. Exquisite. Like nothing he has seen in modern times.”

“A lost art,” Alexander agreed. “There is no longer a world of kings and queens and dukes and princes who can afford to sustain the expertise of carving jewels into entire chambers.”

“He's worried that if he doesn't come up with the money soon, they may search out other buyers.”

“And rightly so. Now that this German group has its hands on it, there is an enormous risk that they will either try to move it or to up the price completely beyond Poland's reach.” Alexander paused, then decided. “Jeffrey, I want you to call Rokovski for me. Inform him that if he is willing to use the remainder of the funds we have in his special account, I shall lend him the balance.”

Jeffrey felt a surge of pride and affection. “He wasn't expecting this. I'm certain it hadn't even occurred to him.”

“Yes, Pavel is that sort of man. Nonetheless, this is my decision. Tell him no papers will be necessary. His word will be sufficient.” His tone darkened. “It is the least I can do, under the circumstances.”

“Speaking of which,” Jeffrey replied. “He said he has to travel to Rome the day after tomorrow.”

“In relation to the chalice?”

“He didn't say exactly, but I'm pretty sure. I hope so, anyway.” Jeffrey hesitated, then continued. “There's more, but maybe it should wait until you get here.”

“What on earth do you mean by that?”

“I don't want to get your hopes up unnecessarily.”

“My dear Jeffrey. I have seldom given you a direct order, but I shall do so now. Tell me everything Pavel said.”

“His researchers have turned up another item. Do you remember his talking about the Vatican emissary who came bearing gifts?”

“Of course.”

“Well, they have found records of a legend. That's what Rokovski called it, a legend. The emissary was a powerful member of the Vatican and traveled through lands totally devastated by the Reformation Wars. There was not a sense of safety nor an absence of starvation until he passed over the Polish borders. Then he arrived in Poland in time for the summer harvest, the only harvest that was still intact in all of northern Europe. All of this convinced him that it was
absolutely imperative for Rome to have a man in this powerful kingdom, a man they could fully trust.”

“Go on.”

Jeffrey took a breath. “The legend is that the Polish king was willing to accept the Pope's man as the new cardinal. But then he told the emissary that he had heard there was a reliquary in the Vatican's possession which contained a segment from the crown of thorns. He wanted it for his kingdom in return for this agreement.”

“And the emissary accepted?” Excitement crackled over the line.

“Rokovski says there are two versions, both of them written down about two hundred years ago, over a century after all this took place. In one, the king backed down and accepted the cardinal without further payment. In the other, the emissary made a
second
trip to Poland. A
secret
one. He traded the original chalice that the Pope had intended as the gift for the reliquary which the king demanded. The emissary then returned to the Vatican with news of the king's acceptance of Rome's cardinal.”

“So the reliquary did find its way to Poland after all,” Alexander exclaimed, “and without Rome's formal approval.”

“Perhaps,” Jeffrey cautioned. “At least, as far as this second legend is concerned. A few years later, the Vatican supposedly discovered that the chalices had been switched. They approached the king of Poland and said there had been a mistake, that the reliquary had been given without the Pope's permission. They requested that it be returned to its rightful place at the heart of Christendom. The king replied that there had been no mistake. Poland had hundreds of valuable chalices, he said, but no such symbol of Christ's suffering and dying for mankind. The only reason he would have considered granting the cardinal the appointment was in return for this priceless gift.”

“I wonder what happened to the emissary,” Alexander murmured.

“Rokovski said he asked the same thing. His researchers told him there was never any further mention of him or his family's name. Not anywhere. It was as though he had never existed.”

“Yet the Vatican could not complain too loudly,” Alexander mused. “There was too much at stake, and the ties with Poland too tenuous.”

“It appears that polite enquiries were made every ten years or so,” Jeffrey replied. “With each new cardinal or king, the question was raised. How would it appear in the eyes of the world if it was learned that such a relic were no longer in Rome? In time, though, as Poland's preeminence continued, an agreement was reached. What was important to Cracow was that they had the relic. What was important to Rome was that the people thought it was still there. So without actually saying as much, Cracow agreed never to make public the fact that the chalice they had was indeed the reliquary.”

“And in the more than three hundred years since the switch was made, there has been time for the secret to be forgotten,” Alexander concluded. “And now that the millennium approaches, there is pressure to bring the reliquary back to Rome.”

“Again, all this could be true only if the second legend is the valid one,” Jeffrey went on. “But I think it is, and so does Rokovski. At least, he said it was worth pursuing to the end. It also appeared that he was on to something else. But it was only half worked out, and Rokovski refused to tell me what he was thinking. All he would say was that he hoped to have something positive to report to you upon his return from Rome.”

“This indeed is a night filled with good news.” Alexander's tone sounded lighter than it had in weeks. “Find out from him when he expects to return to Cracow, if you would. I shall be there myself to greet him.”

“I'll call him first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Splendid. Now tell me, how are your other activities proceeding?”

“Business is great. We've picked up some excellent new pieces.”

“Not new in the strictest sense, I hope.”

“No,” Jeffrey hesitated, then told him about Katya and his visit to the hospital and their decision to work on equipping a new premature birth unit.

When he stopped, Alexander released a long sigh. “My dear Jeffrey, I find myself deeply touched by your act.”

“It was Katya's idea, really.”

“Do not do yourself a disservice. Already you two are beginning to join in true union. The idea of one is given life by the actions of both.” Alexander's voice softened. “And such actions. Yes, you have given me great food for thought, my friend. So. You shall speak with Rokovski and then call me tomorrow? Splendid. Then I shall bid you a good-night.”

CHAPTER 37

“It has taken me over a day to obtain this connection to Schwerin,” Erika declared once she had Kurt on the telephone.

“I would far rather fight with operators than have to do what I have done,” Kurt replied. “Which is sit on my hands.”

“Waiting is pure agony,” Erika agreed.

“Especially when there is nothing but doubt for company.”

“I told you I could be trusted.”