Conspiracy (Dana Black) by Dana Black

Author:Dana Black
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2011-01-17T22:00:00+00:00

2

This was her airport terminal to the world, Katya thought— her way station to freedom. She looked around the now-familiar UBC studio room inside Bernabeau stadium, still scarcely able to believe she was here a second time. The familiar blue walls, the gleaming black-and-chrome cameras and equipment, the bare chromed-steel furniture had been in her thoughts for nearly two weeks now. As she went from interview to interview with correspondents of other nations, she had been tempted, during quiet moments with other reporters when Tamara’s attention had been diverted, to tell them her story, and ask them for help.

But she knew she could not. What could the Europeans or the Africans do for her? She read the papers; she knew how intimidated by the Soviet Union the European and African countries had become. Pravda might call it “enlightened cooperation for mutual prosperity,” but everyone in Moscow who had traveled in the West knew differendy. The fear of war was gradually bringing the Third World and the European West into line, just as the fear of prison camps or worse had brought the Uzbeks and the Byelorussians and the Ukrainian separatists into line. Only from the Americans was there any opposition to be reckoned with.

At least that was what both Sergei and Anton had said after returning from the qualifying matches in Sweden and France last winter.

The voice of Dan Richards cut into her thoughts. “Katya, I know most of our viewers have never been inside the Soviet Union. Could you tell us a bit about everyday life there? Your apartment, your shopping, restaurants, that kind of thing?”

He was keeping his manner absolutely cut-and-dried, so much so that Katya wondered fleetingly if something might have happened to make him decide not to help her. She watched him as she began her answer, partly because the camera lights made her eyes hurt and partly because Tamara was out of her line of vision when she sat that way.

She tried to concentrate on simply giving a straightforward description, but her thoughts kept wandering to the things she could not tell. When she spoke of her Moscow apartment, her thoughts turned to two other men. Their presences were inextricably bound up in her memory with those four small rooms that she shared with her brother Sergei.

Most important, of course, was Anton. Anton of the glad smile and the golden hair. Anton, who had befriended Sergei during a dispute with one of the coaches that could have lost Sergei his position on the World Cup team. Anton, who even now led the team here in Spain in both goals and assists, and whose statistics for each game Katya knew better even than Sergei’s.

Anton Petrovich Volnikov, who had come home from the victorious qualifying tour with his teammate and lifetime drinking companion Sergei Ivanovich Romanov, just after Katya had been shipped home from the International Championship meet with her ankle encased in plaster of paris. Anton’s own apartment was only a few doors away on Kalinin

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.