Chernobyl

Chapter 3

Smin's mother, who has been a widow almost as long as Smin has been alive, lives in a four-room flat in an apartment building on the outskirts of Kiev. This causes a lot of talk among her neighbors. The official allowance for housing in the Soviet Union is nine square meters per person, and here this old woman, who does not even have a job, occupies nearly forty. It is true that old Aftasia Smin is a Party member from the earliest days, but it is also true that she has taken no active part for many years. So the talk of the neighbors is not about Aftasia's status as a veteran of the Civil War but about the real reason she has such a fine apartment. It is, her neighbors tell each other wisely, only because her son is in a high position; and in this the neighbors are right.

When Smin got to his mother's flat he discovered that the surprise was really a surprise. It was an American — two Americans, in fact, for there was a man and his wife.

Young Vassili Smin, who had been complaining for two hours about the prospect of sleeping another night on Babushka's folding Army cot, stopped complaining when he saw the American and the American's tall, young, blonde wife in the tailored canary-yellow slacks and the American's digital watch that told the time not only in Kiev but in Los Angeles as well. Smin saw that his son had fallen in love. He only hoped that

Vassili would somehow manage to refrain from offering to buy the watch from the American who, it turned out, was Smin's second cousin. "You remember," Smin's mother crowed, "I told you about my cousin Yerim, who went to America in 1923? This is his grandson! And this is his wife! He makes for television films about a black man!"

The second cousin's name was nothing like Yerim Skaz-chenko. It was Dean Garfield, but he was still family — family enough to have brought gifts for everyone, although he couldn't have been sure when he left Los Angeles that he would find any particular family members to give gifts to. So they were sort of all-purpose gifts. There was a silver tie clip with a Statue of Liberty on it for Smin, a cashmere sweater for his wife (it was too bad that it was so very tight on her, but apparently it had been cut for an American figure), a pocket calculator for Vassili, a box of liqueur chocolates for everybody, even a wonderfully thick, rich silk scarf which went to Aftasia. Best of all, there was a whole box of video tape cassettes for the whole family, and these were not simply American films which others might have. They were copies of the actual network television program Dean Garfield had actually produced—"Number three in the ratings," Garfield modestly announced.

What made conversation hard was that Garfield spoke only English, his wife just English and a little Spanish; neither knew anything of Smin's own Russian, Ukrainian, French, or German. Nor were Vassili's two years of English good enough for more than half of what Dean Garfield and his wife, Can-dace, said.

Smin's mother had provided for that problem. Aftasia had invited a young Ukrainian couple named Didchuk from the flat just below, both teachers of English in the local schools. Smin could see that they were both a little ill at ease in the presence of a senior Party member who drove a black Chaika with yellow fog lights, not to mention two actual Americans, and he put himself out to be nice to them.

While the young woman was helping Vassili's excited questioning of the glamorous American cousins, Smin chatted easily with the man about the relative merits of the Chaika over the Zhiguli, which he praised, the Moskvich (yes, a fine car, but it needs too much work to keep it running) and the Volga, which he declared in some ways was almost better than his own. The teacher listened intendy and humbly asked Smin's opinion of the Zaparozhets, which he and his wife had thought of purchasing in a year or two. The Zaparozhets was the cheapest car made in the USSR, but Smin had praise for it, too. After all, he reminded the man, it was Ukraine-made and a very good value for the money—"Only, be sure you get one that was manufactured early in the month, before they storm," he said. The teacher nodded gratefully for the advice, though he did not need it. After all, what Soviet citizen did not know all about the merits of every Soviet car, even if his best hope of owning one lay somewhere in the twenty-first century?

In any case, Didchuk discovered, he had lost Smin's attention. The older man was gazing at his wife, and there was half a smile on his face.

For when Selena Smin got a good look at this blonde California goddess, she had taken the first opportunity to disappear into the flat's tiny lavatory. When she came out, her eyelashes were darker, her lips were redder, and she had even touched herself with the scent Smin had brought back from his last trip to Vienna; with affection, Smin realized his wife had decided once and for all to show these Americans that Soviet women did not necessarily have steel teeth and hairy armpits. It pleased Smin to observe that although Dean Garfield did not seem to notice any difference, his beautiful wife immediately did.

What Garfield was doing was listening to Vassili's stammering attempts to deal with the pitfalls of the English language. As Smin caught a few words of what his son was saying, he frowned. "Excuse me," he said to the teacher; and then, to his son, "Vassili? I do not know English, but I recognize such words as neutron and uranium. What are you telling our American friends?"

The boy flushed. "I was only explaining to them what you do, Father."

"Yes, that I am involved in the management of a nuclear power plant, of course. But what else are you saying?"

"Oh, our cousin Garfield did not understand how it was possible to control a nuclear reaction, so I explained to him what you taught me; that although most neutrons are released at once, there are a very few that take a fraction of a second longer, and it is because of them that there is time to adjust the speed of the reaction. Just as you have told me, Father. Did I get it right?"

"Perhaps too right," Smin said dryly. "I don't think Gorodot Khrenov would like you to be explaining nuclear matters to Americans. Go help your.grandmother, please; she is getting ready to feed us."

So Vassili was drafted to put two tables together and find chairs to go around them, and young Mrs. Didchuk to help the formidable old lady put food on the table. In a few minutes they were all seated, one way or another, still talking.

Smin wondered what was going through the Americans' minds. The woman was, after all, very beautiful. She seemed exactly like one of those Western movie stars with their remarkable teeth and the figures of young girls — well, that seemed to be exactly what she was, to be sure. A movie star. From Hollywood. Who no doubt lived in one of those sprawling eight-room or nine-room mansions that clung to mountainsides and looked out over oceans — with, no doubt, a swimming pool in the immense backyard and two or three huge American cars in the garage. What could she be making of his mother's flat with its paper-thin carpet worn bare, its battered furniture, its walls with the paint chipping off in the corners?

He realized, with resignation, that before long there would be more said on this subject. From his wife. Who had been after him all along about his mother's "Khrushchev" flat, thrown up at great speed thirty years ago and decaying rapidly ever since, without even a telephone. "You must realize, Simyon," she would say patiently — again! — "that you hold a very important position. You should live accordingly. Not Brezhnev style, of course; no one does that anymore. But with dignity, even in your mother's apartment, since we often use it." And it would be no good telling her — again! — that the way his mother lived was his mother's own choice, because she would simply point out that old people did not always know what was best for them, after all.

Smin debated whether it was worthwhile to try to forestall some of his wife's remarks by explaining to the Americans just what kind of a woman his mother was. It seemed a daunting job, especially with old Aftasia sitting there and listening to every word. In any case, the conversation was going along very well without that. Garfield, through Mrs. Didchuk, was explaining to the whole group just why he and his wife had decided it was better to live in Beverly Hills than Brentwood, although, of course, Beverly Hills was much more expensive.

In the middle of it, Garfield broke off to stare more closely at what Aftasia Smin had set on the table. Then he grinned and spoke rapidly to his wife, who laughed and replied. Both were obviously discussing the food.

"What are they saying?" Smin asked the male teacher.

Didchuk seemed embarrassed. "It's funny, but Mrs. Garfield said" — he hesitated—"well, she mentioned that she was surprised there were no dishes of cabbage on the table."

Smin laughed. "Tell her, please, that cabbage does not agree with my mother. Was that all?"

"Oh, no." The teacher paused, obviously searching for the tactful words. "Mr. Garfield was saying to his wife what these foods are. He says that those are bitter herbs, and those biscuits are what he calls 'matzos,' and this is a real, pardon me, I don't know the word, it is something like 'cross over'?"

"Oh, my mother is at it again," Smin sighed. "This is the time of a Jewish holiday — what, the second night of Passover? Please tell him that we are not religious, but my mother—"

"Tell him nothing of the sort!" his mother called, setting down a great tureen of soup. "Even if our cousin from America doesn't know Hebrew, he's a Jew. I asked him!"

But it turned out, after a good deal of talk back and forth, that although Dean Garfield really enjoyed the Passover ritual, he said he was not much more of a practicing Jew than Smin himself, in fact was something called a "Unitarian," because his wife had been something called "Methodist" and they had wanted a "Sunday school" to send their children to; and then Smin's mother wanted to hear all about the children.

The chicken broth was excellent — Smin's mother boasted she had stood in line an hour to get the chicken. Then the food began — mushrooms baked in sour cream in individual pots, the meat of the stewed chicken that had made the soup, meat pies, sturgeon in jelly; when all that was done, there was fruit compote and small cakes with poppy-seed filling. The teachers were too timid to eat much at first, but then there was also Georgian wine and Armenian brandy, and at the end icy cold vodka.

By the time of the brandy, and long before the vodka, the teachers were stuffing themselves, and the Americans, though they ate very little, praised everything immensely and drank enough to make up. They even praised Smin's mother's two table spreads, overlapped to cover the round table that was pressed against the long one to make room for eight persons, and did not comment on the curious selection of kitchen chairs, armchairs, and other sittables that surrounded the tables. They obviously enjoyed impressing these relatives, and others, with their prosperity and the high ratings of Garfield's television show, but actually Dean Garfield was impressed with his second cousin too. "Director of a nuclear power plant!" he said through the female teacher. "That's a mighty important job."

"It is the most important job in the Ukraine," Smin's mother said severely, and Smin demurred.

"There are a lot of people who would be surprised to hear that," he told her, and then, for the Americans, told them what Chernobyl was like. Four billion watts of electrical energy derived from the smokeless, pollutionless power of fissioning uranium dioxide; enough to supply an entire city or run a whole countryside of factories.

It turned out that the American cousin had some views on nuclear power. He spoke of San Onofro and Three Mile Island, of earthquake faults and the China syndrome, of children's birth defects and future leukemias. The teachers gamely translated, though they had to consult each other frequently for some of the terms. "Yes," put in Vassili eagerly, almost falling off his seat — as the youngest, he had been given the hassock with pillows piled on top of it, "but our reactors are different. There was a report in a scientific journal years ago — I read it in school — which said that in the Soviet Union the problem of nuclear safety has been solved!"

"No, no," said Smin gently, "not solved. It is never solved. It is true that we know the solutions and embody them in our daily practice, but the solution has to be applied again every day, every minute. Forgive me — I don't want to say anything against American practices—" He waited politely for translation.

"Go ahead," smiled his American cousin in his turn, and added something that made Didchuk stammer as he translated: "I hate the bastards, myself."

Smin was slightly startled, but he went on with his remembered facts. "In America," he said, "it is the human factor that causes nuclear accidents. I mention your Idaho Falls in 1961, where control rods were removed by mistake and three people were killed; in our reactor, the control rods are automatically inserted if anything begins to go wrong. In your Brown's Ferry in Alabama in 1975, a man looked for leaks in the shielding. To find them he used a lighted candle! He set fire to the insulation, and most of the safety systems failed because they lost power — almost that was a total catastrophe. In your Sequoia plant in Tennessee in 1981, more than a quarter of a million liters of radioactive liquid were allowed to leak out. Just a few months ago, at Gore, Oklahoma, someone heated a container of nuclear fuel and caused it to explode, killing a worker and injuring a hundred others. And Three Mile Island— well, everyone knows that at Three Mile Island it was nearly a complete meltdown. It was stopped with only minutes to spare."

"Yes, exactly," nodded Garfield. "It is frightening."

"But all of these are human errors, Cousin Dean. We do not allow human errors to occur. Our workers are not only very highly trained—" Smin swallowed, thinking of the Literaturna Ukraina report; but Dean Garfield would hardly have seen that—"they are also taught to maintain vigilance at all times. Nor are they allowed to work if they are not fit. It is true, Cousin Dean, that in America, sometimes the reactor workers use drugs on the job?"

"I've heard that, yes," Garfield conceded. "I think it was just security guards and maybe laborers, though, not technicians. You don't have grass here?"

The teacher had to have that explained, and translated it finally as "marijuana." Smin shook his head. "But," grinned the American, "I suppose now and then somebody does drink a little?"

"Never!" Smin declared. "No Soviet citizen drinks a little! We drink only very much — pass me your glass!"

Though Smin himself did not drink at all, not even the wine, there was plenty for everyone else, and even the two teachers were flushed and smiling. Smin's mother told over and over how the letter from America had reached her only that morning and she had at once telephoned the hotel and sent a car for the visitors. Vassili Smin explained in detail the great importance of his father's work, and how he himself might someday be a nuclear engineer — or perhaps a helicopter pilot, like his elder brother Nikolai, now already a senior lieutenant (though no one mentioned exactly what country Lieutenant Nikolai Smin was flying his helicopter in).

The Americans told how greatly they had been impressed by Moscow (immense city, like one huge monument) and Leningrad (yes, really, certainly properly called the Venice of the North), and how this evening was, all the same, definitely the high spot of their trip, and they all agreed that it was a great pity that contact had been established so late, since the Garfields were scheduled to leave for Tbilisi in the morning. In the relaxed and friendly atmosphere, Didchuk daringly told a couple of Soviet jokes, his eye on Smin to make sure he was not being indiscreet, including the Radio Armenia one about the definition of a string trio (a Soviet quartet that has just returned from a tour of the West), and Dean Garfield responded with one about Aeroflot stewardesses. (In America the hostesses said, "Coffee, tea or me?" and on Aeroflot they said, "White wine, cherry juice, or go off in a corner, Comrade, and do it to yourself.") But that one, apart from requiring much agitated consultation about the translation, made the woman teacher blush.

Smin stole a glance at his watch. After ten, and they were still sitting around the dinner table. At least, he thought comfortably, it had been, what? three or more hours now when he had not had to think about the problems of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station. He thought, with amused sympathy — a little sympathy and a lot more amusement — of the Chief Engineer and the Personnel man, stuck with trying to get rid of the observers who had no experiment to observe. Not for the first time, he thought that his mother's old-fashioned ways were sometimes a convenience. If there had been a telephone in the house, he would have been tempted to call the plant. Since it was out of the question, he could simply relax.

It was not even difficult to keep up a conversation. Having explained America to his Soviet family, Dean Garfield was now explaining the Soviet Union to them. The)' had already done Leningrad and Moscow — had even, Smin was slightly startled to hear, managed to get tickets to the famous emigre

Vladimir Horowitz's once-in-a-lifetime piano recital in Moscow just a few days earlier. (And how many Soviet citizens would have given a month's pay for such tickets? But, of course, Intourist gave first priority to tourists — who could, after all, have heard him any number of times in America.) And in Kiev they had seen any number of tenth-century cathedrals, and the bones of the old monks in the Lavra catacombs, and the Great Golden Gate Moussorgsky had made famous with his Pictures at an Exhibition; in fact, they were staying at the brand-new Great Gate Hotel, just across from the Gate itself on the street called the Khreshchatik.

Garfield had funny stories about their pilgrimages: "So the guide showed us the footbridge to those beaches, you know? The ones across the river in Kiev? And I told her that in New York we had not only footbridges to islands in the river but cable cars. Then she showed us that Rainbow Arch that's supposed to commemorate, what is it, the joining of Russia and the Ukraine, and I told her that we had one that looked exactly like it in St. Louis — the Gateway Arch — only it's two hundred meters tall and it has little cars inside it that take you right up to the top."

"Yes, everything is bigger in America," Aftasia said dryly. "What, you're not eating the compote? Don't you like it?"

Then Smin's son, getting braver about practicing English, began telling his cousins about the four great football players on the team of the Chernobyl plant, the Four Seasons, and Dean Garfield responded with stories about his own team, something called the Los Angeles "goats," said Didchuk, although Smin could not quite believe that was the right name.

Smin yawned as his son went on explaining other things to the guests, until he saw the way the Americans were studying the glassy scars on his face and neck. From the expressions on their faces, distress and sympathy, he knew just what his son was saying.

Smin placed a gentle hand on his son's shoulder and addressed Didchuk. "Say for me, please," he said, "that Vassili, like all boys, is fascinated by stories about war. Especially he likes to boast about his father's heroic adventures, but in fact I was merely trapped in a tank when it burned. It was more than forty years ago."

"But you received four medals!" his son cried, distressed.

"And I hope for you nothing more than that you should never be in a position to earn such medals," Smin said firmly. "Now, whose glass is empty?"

It was turning into a long evening, and a wearing one after all, with this business of trying to carry on a friendly conversation with new-met relatives through translators. Smin was glad when the talk passed from him. The women were talking among themselves, the young teacher, Mrs. Didchuk, chatting in English with the glamorous American blonde woman, Mrs. Garfield. Aftasia Smin, on the fringes, asked. "So what are you telling her?"

"Why," said Mrs. Didchuk, flushing with remembered pleasure, "just that yesterday, when I went to the store, I saw that they had hundreds of rolls of bathroom paper. Imagine! All you could want! So I bought twelve, and the clerk scolded me, can you imagine, saying, 'There is no need to hoard, from now on there will always be plenty!' Do you think that is true?"

"I think," said old Aftasia Smin, "that that is not a proper subject to discuss with our guests at the table." Then, her eyes suddenly gleaming, "I have something else that is interesting. Will you ask my cousin's wife if she will come with us into my bedroom? There is something I would like to show her."

"She is at it again," said Smin's wife, frowning after her mother-in-law as she led the female guests away.

"I suppose she is," said Smin, and when the women came back, he was confirmed in his opinion by the new way the American blonde looked at Aftasia Smin. Aftasia had been showing off her war wounds again. Well, she had a right; not every old woman in Kiev had fought bravely in the Civil War, as well as owning a Party membership twenty years senior to Smin's own.

Surreptitiously Smin glanced again at his watch. Past midnight! And he had been up since six. Of course, the next day, he thought idly, would not be very strenuous. The experiment with trying to get power from a turned-off reactor would probably not take place on a Saturday. Perhaps they could even defer it until the Director came back? It was his baby, after all. But it was just like the Director to conceive the idea and then find "important business" somewhere else, so that

Smin was stuck with the responsibility of carrying it out. Important business! Shooting ducks outside of Moscow! When, really, if Director Zaglodin desired to kill a few ducks, there were millions of them in the Pripyat Marshes, just north of the plant…. But, of course, it was not the ducks Zaglodin wanted, it was the company; he was hunting powerful connections more than waterfowl.

Smin yawned and eyed the vodka botde. But it was not yet time for the one drink he allowed himself each day. "Can I at least have some tea?" he asked his mother just as the male teacher, Didchuk, said eagerly:

"Can you imagine? Mr. and Mrs. Garfield say that their home is only a few kilometers from Disneyland!"

So it was a happy enough evening, and an interesting one for all concerned. It took Smin's mind off, or nearly off, the problems of Chernobyl and he forgave his mother for her surprises, even for her stubborn decision, at her time in life, to decide to observe Jewish holidays again. By the time Vassili was yawning and the old grandmother had dozed off in her seat, it was too late to try to get a taxi. Smin drove his new relatives back to their hotel, with Didchuk along to interpret.

Until they had crossed the bridge over the Dnieper River, they were almost alone in the streets of suburban Kiev. The officers in roving militia cars glanced at them as they passed, but few policemen would bother the driver of a black Chaika with yellow fog lights at any hour. Then, as they approached the center of the city, there was activity, even at this hour. In the main square, Army trucks with batteries of floodlights made the scene bright as new banners were hoisted into position for the May Day parade—we will fulfill our plan! and we demand peace and freedom for the world! As they Crossed the square where the great old cathedral stood, Smin said to Didchuk, "Tell them that services are held there every Sunday; if one wishes to believe in God, one may."

"I already have," said Didchuk proudly. "They were very pleased to hear it."

The May Day parade would go along the Khreshchatik, of course — there was no more famous street in Kiev. They had to dodge around the Army trucks to get to the entrance of the Great Gate Hotel. Of course, the hotel doors were locked at that hour. When Didchuk had roused the doorkeeper to let them in, they all got out of the car and stood for a moment in the chilly April night air. "I wish," Candace Garfield said earnestly through Didchuk's translation, "that we had been able to get together earlier, Cousin Simyon. It's really too bad that we have to leave for Tbilisi tomorrow. We have enjoyed this very much, and if you ever come to Beverly Hills—"

"Of course," smiled Smin gallantly, reaching to put his arms around her. In his hug she was even slimmer than he had thought, and there was a scent of France and America that came from her hair. "Ah, well," he said to Didchuk as they drove away, "there is simply one more duty call we will have to pay next time we are in California. What a nuisance, isn't it?" But now that they were alone Didchuk appeared to have remembered that he was in the presence of a Deputy Director and senior Party member, and he did not seem to know how to respond to the pleasantry.

By the time Smin was back in his mother's flat everyone was asleep. He was careful not to wake his son as he poured himself the 150-milliliter nightcap of brandy that was all he allowed himself anymore and gratefully stretched out next to his gently snoring wife. It had been an interesting evening, if sometimes puzzling — what had Dean Garfield meant when he called his wife a "Valley girl"? And certainly it had been a pleasant ending to a day that had been full of irritating worries.

When the doorbell rang and someone knocked heavily at the same time, Smin woke up with a start. It was after three o'clock! Selena was upright next to him, her face strained. "No, no," Smin soothed, not having to ask what had frightened her because he knew, not having to reassure her that the bad days when a knock at three in the morning meant only one specific, hopeless thing were over, because she knew that too.

He almost persuaded himself to relax as he listened to the voices outside, until his son burst into the room, a blanket wrapped around him, crying, "Papa! It's the militia! They have brought an important message for you — you must go back to Chernobyl at once!"