Prizes (28 page)

“Is it so obvious?” she inquired.

“Yes—you didn’t even ask me what car I drive. Which is yet another reason I find you irresistible.” He smiled broadly.

Irresistible? During her childhood and teenage years Anya had been variously praised by her parents and the other inmates at Second River as “cute,” “sweet,” and “charming.” But the notion that she might be an attractive woman had never entered her mind.

“May I have the honor of driving you home, Anya Alexandrovna?”

“Oh,” she replied, instantly relieved. “Olga and I would enjoy that very much.”

“I’m sure she would,” her friend’s uncle replied. “But she’s staying overnight with her parents. And besides, there are only two seats in my car.”

“In that case, I must respectfully decline,” Anya responded bravely.

Avilov looked puzzled—and impressed.

And thus Anya shivered in the cold December night waiting for a taxi that would transport her back to the safety of the hospital dormitory.

The next time, Avilov caught her at her own game, inviting both Anya and Olga—her “chaperone” as he joked in his otherwise formal letter—to hear him lecture at the academy on the genetic aspects of Huntington’s disease.

Anya could not refuse, for the simplest of reasons: she wanted to go.

Dmitri was a brilliant speaker, with a rare gift of being able to make himself intelligible even to nonexperts in his field—although Anya was, after all, a qualified medical doctor.

After the lecture there was a small reception in the elegant high-ceilinged room adjoining the amphitheater.

Both Anya and Olga stood awkwardly on the side-lines watching noted scientists fawning about the guest of honor. It was clear, even from their distant vantage point, that Avilov was enjoying the energetic flattery.

“I feel silly,” Olga confessed. “I mean, nobody wants to talk to us. Why don’t we get the hell out of here and have something to eat? Maybe we could meet some guys.”

“Uh, not yet,” Anya demurred. “Guys” were the furthest thing from her mind. “I mean—I mean, it’s sort of interesting to watch.”

“Then I’m getting another vodka,” Olga countered, and went off to fetch it.

Anya was inexperienced but not naive. She knew that in accepting Dmitri Petrovich’s invitation, she would not this time go home alone. And yet she wondered how he would disencumber himself from his niece’s presence. But Anya had underestimated her admirer’s resourcefulness.

At precisely nine-thirty Ivan, an attractive, crew-cut, scholarly young man introduced himself as academician Avilov’s chief research assistant. He recited what was obviously a prepared speech to the effect that, although he knew that Anya would have to return to the hospital and study, he hoped that Olga would come along with a few of the younger staff to listen to jazz in a terrific place on Novy Arbat.

Olga was too delighted to realize it was a ploy. Either that, thought Anya, or she was a consummate actress.

For a moment Anya feared she had been genuinely abandoned. She was about to fetch her coat when
Avilov glided up to her and whispered, “We will meet in Seventh Heaven.”

“What?” For a moment she was totally baffled.

“That’s the restaurant on top of the television tower. I’ve booked a table for ten o’clock.”

She spent nearly an hour walking around Red Square to avoid the embarrassment of arriving early and having to sit self-consciously alone in a sophisticated place where she would feel inadequately dressed.

Rising skyward nearly two thousand feet, the Ostankino Television Tower was perhaps the ultimate expression of the Soviet obsession with phallic monuments. Seventh Heaven rotated slowly, giving the distinguished diners the opportunity to see the entire city between cocktails and dessert.

Since its service was similar to that of all Russian eating establishments—slow, slovenly, and surly—most guests usually traveled the 360-degree circuit at least twice.

Anya had never in her life seen anything like it—the guests were elegantly garbed, and there was a glint of what looked like real silver on the tables.

Avilov was already seated and rose to greet her, smiling.

“You didn’t have to walk around in circles, you know. I was here on the dot of ten.”

Anya hoped she was not blushing. Had he seen her meandering? Or could he simply read her mind? Nor could she hide her uneasiness when he ordered their meal.

“What is the matter, little one—do you not like cutlets à la Kiev?”

“No,” she stumbled, “it’s just that—”

Avilov nodded. “I understand, Annoushka. It cannot have been frequently on the bill of fare at a place like Second River.”

“You know about my family?” She felt more nervous than ever.

He nodded and replied gently, “I was still in primary school at the time, but I remember that last spasm of Stalin’s paranoia. No one spoke up in those physicians’ defense, and our principal lectured us about being wary of certain kinds of doctors who poisoned their patients.”

“Did you believe it?” she asked.

“To be quite honest, I wished I was already a doctor so I could poison the principal.”

Anya laughed.

“What I can’t understand,” he continued, his voice now softly serious, “is why your father never got recalled. I have at least half a dozen friends in the academy who are graduates of the Gulag system.”

“I guess he didn’t have any friends in the academy,” she replied, touched by what seemed like genuine compassion in his voice.

“He has now,” Avilov replied, putting his large hand on hers. “Don’t worry, I have got plenty of vitamin P—
protektsiya.
” He looked into her eyes and understood that she was too moved to speak.

Finally, her lips parted and let forth a single syllable. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“You don’t strike me as someone who makes quarrels with the system. Why should you want to help them?”

“You’re right,” he conceded. “I’m the most selfish person I know. But if I do something for them, perhaps I can make you like me.”

“I already like you,” she whispered.

“Enough to marry me?”

For a moment Anya was too incredulous to believe what she had heard. Only then did her face become a mask of total shock.

“Why?” she repeated.

“You are so full of questions,” Dmitri reprimanded. “Even Lenin didn’t try to abolish love at first sight.”

She shook her head in dismay. “I just don’t understand it. You could have any girl you wanted—”

“But, Anya, you’re not ‘any girl.’ You’re someone very special. You have a gift of happiness that’s almost magical.”

She mustered the courage to defend herself against her own emotional impulses. “How many times have you said that to a woman, Dmitri Petrovich?”

“Never,” he insisted. “Never in my life.”

At twenty minutes to one he opened the car door for her. As she brushed by him to sit down, she had the fleeting impression that he was about to embrace her. But he did not.

When he started the motor and put Charles Aznavour on his cassette player, Anya was certain they would be driving to his apartment.

There too she was wrong.

And when Dmitri dropped her at the hospital and did not even attempt a perfunctory good-night kiss, she was convinced she had made a gauche fool of herself.

Only when the roses arrived the next morning—and with them a formal note requesting her to marry him—did she know she had been wrong about everything.

Except the fact that he really loved her.

October 21, 1982, was the happiest day of Anya’s life. Now she was not only a diplomate in obstetrics, but at the Matrimonial Department of City Hall she became the bride of academician Professor Dmitri Avilov. Her new husband had arranged a sumptuous reception at what would be their apartment on a high floor of one of the giant blocks bordering the Moskva River.

Anya felt like a princess in a fairy tale. For among the many well-wishers were the two dearest people in her life.

Her mother and father.

But that was lifetimes ago and a million miles away.

28
 

Propelled by her dazzlingly creative work in the two graduate seminars, Isabel da Costa achieved her goal—or more accurately, Raymond’s—and in the late summer of 1986 became the youngest graduate in the history of Berkeley. Summa cum laude in physics, with a shining gold Phi Beta Kappa key hanging around her neck.

Once again the press was out in force, and once again Muriel and Peter reenacted their familiar roles of loving mother and admiring brother. Though some of the reporters were anxious to get photos of father and daughter, whom one of them had dubbed “the thermodynamic duo,” Raymond had outmaneuvered them and made certain that they were only photographed as a complete family.

Though the TV cameras concentrated almost exclusively on close-ups of Isabel, when she graciously thanked her family for their support, they intercut to close-ups of Ray, the man she singled out as “still the best teacher I ever had.”

Back in June, during her brief visit home for Peter’s graduation, she and her brother had forged a relationship that continued to strengthen, even when Peter—himself entering college that fall—was consigned to the status of wallpaper.

They went to dinner at the Heidelberg, and continued
to talk about their futures as if they were on the same level of magnitude.

Peter told her that he was thinking of majoring in physical education. “What’s next for you, sis?” he asked, although he already knew the answer. His generous nature enabled him to admire Isabel without envying her.

“Do you have any suggestions?” she asked playfully.

“Actually, I do,” he replied. “I mean, my advice would be to take a trip around the world.”

“What for?”

“God, can’t you even guess? You know all the formulas that govern the movement of the universe but you’ve never even seen your own planet. A couple of buddies and I are using the money we earned washing cars on weekends to go backpacking in France. I’d invite you to come along, but I already know what Dad would say.”

“Gosh, I’d love to go, but it’s urgent that I start on my master’s thesis with Pracht right away.”

“Isn’t that a little bit premature, even for you?” Peter asked. “I mean, you haven’t even done the course work—or,” he said with a fond smile, “did you finish it all last night while I was sleeping?”

“I know it sounds strange,” she explained. “This is strictly between us—do you know anything about the Theory of Forces?”

“Only what I remember from
Star Wars,
” he joked. “Can you put it in language that a half-wit can understand?”

“Okay,” she began, “It’s like this. Conventional physics recognizes four different forces in nature. Most everybody is familiar with gravity and electrodynamics—they operate over large distances. But then there is a ‘strong’ force, which works over a short range and holds atomic nuclei together, and a ‘weak’ force—which is associated with the decay of neutrons outside the nucleus. Are you with me so far?”

“Let’s just say I believe you—but I wouldn’t like to take a test on it. Go on, I’ll keep straining my brain muscles.”

“Well, ever since Newton, physicists have made about a zillion attempts to develop things called G.U.T.’s, or Grand Unified Theories—some way of encompassing all four forces. Einstein tried, but even he couldn’t find an answer. Twenty years ago, a guy named Stephen Weinberg made the best unifying attempt so far by using a mathematical technique known as gauge symmetry. I won’t bore you with the details.”

“Thanks.” Her brother laughed.

“Lately, theoretical physics is evolving G.U.T.’s using principles of symmetry, but there’s still no definitive answer.”

“Which is where you come in—right?”

“Not yet.” She smiled. “Don’t be so anxious to get me onstage.”

“I can’t help it, I’m rooting for you to get there first.”

“Well, there’re a couple of guys still ahead of me on the track, including Karl. He’s collaborating with a team in Cambridge and one in Germany. They’re all gathering data in the field of high-energy physics which can only be explained by the existence of a
fifth
force. That might be the key to the whole picture. I’ve read their article in draft—and obviously so have the heads of a lot of Physics departments.

“If he’s right, it’s a mega-breakthrough, and that’ll mean mind-boggling job offers not only from MIT, but the other go-go schools who recruit potential Nobelists like trophies on a shelf.”

“But where do you come in?” Peter smiled.

“Your patience is rewarded. Here I am—really trying to get into this whole question. And since nobody is closer to the material than Karl, maybe you can understand why I want to start this while he’s still in our backyard.”

Peter nodded and said with affection, “Isabel, for
once I find myself agreeing with you. Go for it. And may the fifth force be with you.”

Muriel had been a good trouper. But this was to be her last appearance as perfect wife and mother.

Her final conversation with Ray was strangely poignant. They sat at the round, dark wood table of the rathskeller, its surface etched with generations of initials of lovers and vandals.