in size, extending for hundreds of feet, but in the center all that could be seen was a control console, set in concrete, with dials and instruments whose illuminated arrows quivered in different positions. All at once, loud detonations like gunfire had sounded from down below, and everybody had flinched. Discharges, Adamek had explained. While the electromagnetic bursts followed one another more and more closely, a team of researchers had come out onto the platform. They were wearing protective suits that covered them completely, including their faces, and they carried a cloth about ten square feet in size, mounted on supports. An unscientific observer might have thought that the researchers were bringing in their dirty laundry to be cleaned. Before they reached the control center, Adamek had already ordered his group to leave. Inaudible in their synthetic slippers, the visitors had hastily marched to the exit; in the passage, the Asian had given them back their watches.
Anna was exhausted. Since early morning, she and the others had been bombarded with impressions, had seen things the likes of which few Soviet citizens would ever get to see in their entire lifetimes. Despite her weariness, she sat at the table and took from her bag the book she’d brought along. It was a standard text in theoretical physics for students in their first semester.
“In the condensed phase, matter appears as either a solid or a liquid. Free atoms form a crystal, producing a binding energy of an order of magnitude equivalent to …”
Anna considered the sequence of signs that followed and then read them aloud: “A hundred kcal divided by mol equals one hundred times two point six times ten to the twenty-second power divided by six times ten to the twenty-third power eV …” It was the first formula in the book, and one of the simplest.
“The empirical fact that the band structures of free electrons diverge shows that valence electrons are only weakly scattered on ionic cores.”
Discouraged, Anna slammed the book shut. Reading it was pointless. Even if she were to get close to the physicist who was the subject of her assignment, even if she should manage to have a conversation with him, she wouldn’t understand the information she obtained! She paced helplessly around the room: wallpaper, closet, bed, her bag, and, outside, the silent street. She felt dead tired and, at the same time, exceedingly nervous. From childhood on, she’d been taught this principle: Every individual must undertake and carry out tasks assigned by the Party. Today, however, Anna wanted to slip out of her otherwise so reliable skin and admit to herself that there was no coping with her present assignment.
Sounds from outside her door indicated that dinner was imminent. She felt hungry, but when she looked at the clock, she realized that it wasn’t worth the trouble to go to the dining room, because Anton would be picking her up very soon. Anna opened the closet; the short dress would be inconspicuous under her coat. She undressed and washed her face in front of the mirror.
Punctual to the minute, the black ZIL turned into the rear courtyard. Anna was waiting on the steps. The kitchen was at its busiest, the windows were open, but no one observed the member of the visiting group who slid onto the backseat of the limousine and pulled the door shut behind her.
“Today we don’t have far to go,” said Anton, nodding to her in the rearview mirror.
They drove past two blocks of houses on the main street, turned into the riverfront promenade, and stopped in front of a one-story villa.
“Who lives here?”
“The house belongs to a member of the Academy who’s seldom in Dubna.” Anton got out, opened the gate, and drove onto the grounds.
Alexey received Anna neither outside the house nor at the front door. Curious, she stepped into a comfortable room; there was a wing chair close to the fireplace. Alexey sat in the chair with one hand pressed against his forehead and the other raised in a formal gesture of greeting. Anna laughed—Alexey was imitating a famous painting of Stalin. “Little Father, how are you?” she asked, giving the Pioneers’ hand signal and stepping before the Great Leader.
“One grows old, Comrade,” he answered in the familiar rasping intonation. “It does one good to see you young activists, your fresh faces.” Bulyagkov sprang to his feet. “And your splendid bodies!” He took Anna in his arms and stroked her hair. Composed as always, Anton brought in a load