скачать книгу бесплатно
The stranger shrugged.
“It depends on what you call a thief… So, in a way.”
Andrey shrugged his shoulders.
“Sounds complicated. For me, it’s easy: I’m Andrey…”
“Fomenko, Andrey Grigorievich, twenty-two years old, worker-peasant from the Chelyabinsk province, graduate of the Moscow Mechanical Engineering.” Noticing the astounded look of the future physicist, he shrugged his shoulders. “Have I got it wrong?”
“On the contrary, and this is disturbing,” Andrey muttered. “Will you surprise me further, or should we immediately part ways?”
“Why run, Andrey, if I’m here for you?” The Cat took a sip of his beer and looked cheerfully at his new acquaintance. “Don’t make your eyes round, boy. I'm not a devil from a snuffbox! Let's get some fresh air, and we’ll talk. I know more about you than just your origins. I can tell you about your mother, born a noblewoman. To her parents attracting the disfavor of the authorities, she married a metalworker and taught physics at a school. This is where you got your thirst for science. Your father, Grigory Kuzmich, perished in the war, buried near Rzhev as a senior sergeant, order-bearer and hero. Just like your uncle, who really died near Sevastopol. And his brothers, who almost reached Berlin. I also know about your three escapes to the front and your successes in that English entertainment, which we call boxing. Easy now!” He raised his hand when he noticed Andrey putting his hand in his pocket. “Piggy don’t bother. First, because I’m here strictly on business. My knowledge of some things should make you uneasy, on the one hand, and on the other, make you wonder where in a Soviet country such an informed comrade might come from. Now, if I’m, shall we say, an enemy spy, then you are right. There is simply nowhere without the lead. But what if it’s quite the contrary, comrade future physicist-engineer?”
Andrey carefully pulled his hand out of his pocket, in which there really was a respectable lead-filled cosh. This cosh was quite the substitute for brass knuckles and, unlike the latter, not illegal to carry. Fomenko did not dare risk it in the Pit without his little ‘helper’. He had a nasty experience before. But how did the Cat know about this? Or was he really one of ‘them’?
“Very well, how are we going to leave, comrade… Cat? Naum is about to return with the crayfish and beer. What will he think?”
“He won’t think anything,” laughed the Cat and there was something in it that Andrey liked. “We'll leave a couple of red ones for him on the countertop, and he'll forget about everything right away.”
With these words, he pulled out a pair of chervonets from a leather shovel purse and pushed them under the plate with the crayfish remains.
“Let's go,” he nodded to Andrey and, without looking back, moved through the haze to the exit. Andrey looked around helplessly, grabbed his crumpled cap from the counter and some pickled fishtails that were nearby, and followed him outside.
Naum arrived at the table only a quarter of an hour later but found only empty mugs and plates, from which the local punks even dared to clean the fish bones. Just a couple of lonely coins under the plate.
Naum put the mugs and crayfish on the marble countertop and looked around, just in case. Andrey and the mysterious stranger were nowhere to be found.
“Oh well,” said the artist to himself. “Looks like I’m lucky today!”
And he knocked away the first mug. Ahead was a wonderful evening, worthy of a genuine servant of the muses.
“And then we Comrade Kurchatov gave his lecture, and I finally realized that my vocation is nuclear energy.” Andrey stopped and stared at the Cat. He looked at him with a mocking squint. “Why are you so interested in this? You don’t look like you’ve even been through seventh grade, and now you’re talking about splitting atoms.”
The man pushed back his cap and threw some careful glances at either side of them. The Moscow evening was noisy all around. Girls in light dresses flocked along the Tsvetnoy Boulevard alley. Under the tree canopy, the old men crowded around the benches in groups, concentrating on their chess games played out, probably for years, since the pre-war days.
A gang of boys cheerfully drove a shabby bicycle rim without a tire in front of them. It rattled desperately along the gravel of the path and strove from time to time to run off into the roadside acacias. Still, the boys deftly guided it with a branch in the right direction.
The capital was moving away from the nightmare of war. Men in shabby tunics with bandaged wounds were becoming increasingly rare, and the city filled with crowds of workers eager to take their places behind the machines, which had missed those hands so much during those four terrible years.
Almost all the enterprises were working again. The morning crowds of workers hurried to the factory gates. In the evenings, tired but satisfied they lived through another peaceful day, the freshly painted subway trains delivered them to their homes.
Stalinist skyscrapers rose skyward. The new MSU building would soon adorn the Lenin Hills, just as the giant apartments on Kutuzovsk and Kotelniy Embankment reached for the heavens. And on Smolensk Square, the new building of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stood tall and proud. Moscow grew and expanded, throwing off the last traces of the recent fighting with her discarded blackout camouflage.
Andrey noticed a moment’s confusion in his new acquaintance but interpreted it in his own way.
“What’s up, comrade? Haven't you been to the capital recently?”
Kotov turned to Andrey and laughed.
“Look at that… No, comrade Fomenko, I haven’t been out of here in a while. Business, you know. I just can't get enough of a peaceful Moscow. How everything has changed here. For the better, Andryusha, for the better, of course. Where is all this dullness, constant fear of bombing, balloons in the cloudy sky?”
Andrey laughed.
“So when was it? Five years already have passed since then, or even more. If you recall, when the Germans have driven away from their trenches.”
“That’s what I’m talking about,” laughed Kotov. "But before my eyes, there’s still that Moscow, unbroken, belligerent. But what am I talking about? Let’s move on to something more serious. So, you say, Comrade Kurchatov lectured you.”
Andrey gasped as he remembered the quiet talk of a lecturer that was not familiar to anyone. It was later that they were simply fascinated by this unknown speaker. At first, against the background of eminent professors, he was merely a modest man with disheveled hair. To them, he seemed to be an assistant professor, a ‘loser’ who accidentally came out to replace one of their venerable teachers. But only until that moment when he uttered the first sentence of the first lecture: “My friends, remember: man's life is not eternal, but science and knowledge cross the threshold of the centuries!” And then the journey to the fantastic country began, where the atom reigns.
“Yes, he was amazing!”
“Didn’t you want to work in this scientific field?” The Cat looked deep into Andrey's eyes, which made chills run down his spine, not from fear, but from the anticipation of significant changes.
“Of course,” the young man choked, suddenly frozen. “Who are you, comrade? We must now say goodbye, and it would be better if you’ll never cross my path again. I’ll surely turn your over to the first militiaman I can find and let them deal with you as they see fit.”
The Cat raised his hand.
“But, but, young man, you want songs, and I have them, as they say in Odessa. The organs are already nearby.”
He pulled a red booklet out of his inner pocket, and Andrey's eyes were drawn by the gold-embossed blue letters: ‘The Ministry of State Security of the USSR’. He slowly raised his head and looked into the eyes of this mysterious man.
“That’s what this entire show was for? You couldn’t just introduce yourself, and then there’s the suspicious conversation, hints… In fact, what have I done to interest your institution in the first place? I did nothing, couldn’t have done anything, nor was I ever involved in anything until now, as they say.”
The Cat burst out laughing:
“What do you think we’re doing, youngster? Despite the films you may have seen, we don’t spend our days jumping about the roofs. No, buddy, we have a lot of things to do in other areas as well. To begin with, I will introduce myself in the full form: Major of State Security Kotov, Sergey Vladimirovich. You, my friend, I know all about right back to the seventh generation, so don’t bother introducing yourself.”
“That much is clear,” Andrei muttered. “Even so, why am I here?”
Kotov scanned the surrounding area and nodded towards an empty bench:
“Shall we sit down? And talk?”
Andrey shrugged his shoulders and headed in that direction.
When they both settled down in the shade of a spreading willow, the major suggested in a conspiratorial tone:
“Would you like to work for the good of the socialist motherland?”
Andrey laughed, and Kotov liked his laugh: such a pure laugh, without mockery, open.
“But I’ll work for her benefit according to the distribution. Then I'll just get my diploma first. I’m going to some giant factory; they are building so many of them now. I’ll work hard and make the most of it.”
Kotov chuckled:
“Cheeky. A cheeky young man, taking into account who you’ve just involved in this philosophical conversation.”
“Why, I know who I’m talking to, comrade Major. It’s just that I have nothing to fear before Soviet law.”
Kotov looked absentmindedly at the sky: in the high June blue, cirrus clouds crawled lazily, slightly tinted by the sunset sun. He took his cap from his head, crumpled it in his hands, then put it next to him.
“And the artisan’s outfit suits you,” Andrey said unexpectedly. Kotov raised an eyebrow in surprise.
“Really?”
“Certainly! Even if Naum was led on by this masquerade. And he has a trained eye.”
“Flattering, flattering,” muttered the major, and looked intently into the eyes of the now-former student. “And if I offer you work in our department?”
Andrei even got up.
“Me? The Chekists? Well, how could you…”
“What’s wrong?”
“No.” Andrey was embarrassed. Kotov heeded his reaction.
Then he said:
“The country needs you, comrade Fomenko.”
Andrey was even taken aback. He plopped back onto the bench.
“What, mobilize? The war’s been over for, like, five years already. Or not?”
Kotov shook his head vigorously:
“No, young man. For us, and you, by and large, the war is not over yet. It’s not on the battlefields, not in the air, not on the ocean. The current war is going on for drawing boards, in scientific laboratories, at test sites. And it’s only people like you, young and talented scientists, who can win this war and allow the rest of the world to sleep comfortably. Yes, the stakes in this battle are no longer this that country: the entire world is in danger.”
“And you mean?”
“I just want to say that we need you as a consultant on… Shall we say nuclear power?”
Fomenko began to rise from the bench again, momentarily speechless.
“But I…”
“You want to say, young man, that you did not specialize in this profile but only listened to the full course of lectures on the subject, right?”
“Well, about that…”
“So it's not a problem,” Kotov said as he slapped him with his wide palm on the back. “All the missing knowledge you can get from those who are working on the subject. And then already advise us in the process, so to speak.”
“In the process of… what?”
Kotov raised his forefinger.
“Now that is, as they say in the novels, my friend, a completely different story. Just decide for yourself, you are with us or not? If not, then consider today's meeting as if it didn’t occur.”
“What if I say yes?” Andrey asked in a hoarse voice. Kotov smiled:
“Then we'll talk.”
“Yes,” Andrey breathed out. For a moment, the major simply looked into his eyes, then got up and pulled on his coat.
“Come on,” he said.
“Where?” asked Andrey, automatically rising from the bench. Kotov chuckled.
“To a bright future, young man,” he said mysteriously and rushed along the alley to the exit from the park. After hesitating for a second, Andrey rushed after him.
June 17, 1950
22:50
Stalin’s office
Kremlin, Moscow
Beria was sitting on a bulky, uncomfortable couch, which he had long ago christened Stalin’s 'Procrustean bed', and waited patiently while Stalin read to the end of his memo. It has been like this since he had just taken up the post of People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR. Although he and Joseph Vissarionovich have always had a simple relationship, he never spoke to him, except through the lengthy memorandum.
Stalin reading his memos had become a kind of ritual between them. Beria knew that once Stalin has finished reading, some time will be spent pacing the small office with quick steps. Then he will stop and, with his hands behind his back and looking at the Kremlin courtyard, utter the traditional: “And how should we evaluate all this, Comrade Beria?”
And only after that their real productive conversation will start. He continued to wait. And he was not mistaken in his expectations.
Stalin finished reading. He put the printed text aside, then put the still unlit pipe in the crystal ashtray. He got up heavily, put his hands behind his back, and went to the window. Without turning around, he asked over his shoulder:
“And so, Lavrenty? Did the Germans really evacuate their physicists to Latin America? And how do we assess all this now, Comrade First Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers?”
Lavrenty Pavlovich knew the Master grasped the essence of the question.
“As I understand it, you will visit these gentlemen at their home, aren’t you, Lavrenty?”
Beria paused, which implied a respect for the Leader's ability to grasp the essence of things stacked up by bureaucrats. Only then did he cautiously answer:
“Koba, in March you set a problem for me. Now, I propose a solution. It’s a tough one, I agree. We’ll be up against the murder of Trotsky for some time, and there’s going to be a full-scale manhunt, not only for Nazi criminals but also for their henchmen. But with the case I’m reporting, both of our new Bureau members will be just a cover for the primary operation. We simply have to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons in the world. Well, to the extent possible, of course.”
Stalin turned to him, brought his right hand behind his back and shoved it under his lapel jacket in a Napoleonic manner. For some time, he stared at Beria, then nodded his massive head. His tobacco-reddened mustache moved in a predatory way:
“Hopefully, this time, you won’t have any leaks. There’s a lot at stake here. And you’re proposing to use some very green youngsters. How does this fit in with the principal aim?”
Beria was ready for this question and clearly stated:
“Sudoplatov and I have considered all options and settled on this.”
“Explain.”
“If you please, Joseph Vissarionovich.” Beria always knew how to grasp this line, beyond which the 'familiar' Koba suddenly gained a name and patronymic. “Three people are proposed for the group. The commander of the group was an experienced ‘illegal’ intelligence officer, a professional to the marrow of his bones, who had practiced in one of the Spanish-speaking countries. Two operatives will be sent with him, one of whom is preparing to work with the local population and liaise with the embassy. The second is a consultant on nuclear physics. This will allow us to determine just how interested our country should be in these secret German physicists if they really exist.”
