"Several of them were popular locally. In view of Comrade Zverev's recent
pronouncements of increased freedom of press and speech, I thought it best
not to make a public display. Instead, I took measures to charge
individual members with inefficiency in their work, with corruption or
graft, or with other crimes having nothing to do with the reality of the
situation. Six or seven in all were imprisoned, others demoted. Ten or
twelve I had switched to other cities, principally into more backward
areas in the virgin lands."
"And the ringleaders?" the security head asked.
"There were two of them, one a research chemist of some prominence, the
other a steel plane manager. They were both, ah, unfortunately killed in
an automobile accident while under the influence of drink."
"I see," Blagonravov nodded. "So actually the whole rat's nest was stamped
out without attention being brought to it so far as the Magnitogorsk
public is concerned." He nodded heavily again. "You can almost always be
depended upon to do the right thing, Ilya. If you weren't so confoundedly
good a field man, I'd make you my deputy."
Which was exactly what Simonov would have hated, but he said nothing.
"One thing," his chief said. "The origin of this, ah, _club_ which turned
into a tiny underground all of its own. Did you detect the finger of the
West, stirring up trouble?"
"No." Simonov shook his head. "If such was the case, the agents involved
were more clever than I'd ordinarily give either America or Common Europe
credit for. I could be wrong, of course."
"Perhaps," the police head growled. He eyed the bottle before him but made
no motion toward it. He wiped the palm of his right hand back over his
bald pate, in unconscious irritation. "But there is something at work that
we are not getting at." Blagonravov seemed to change subjects. "You can
speak Czech, so I understand."
"That's right. My mother was from Bratislava. My father met her there
during the Hitler war."
"And you know Czechoslovakia?"
"I've spent several vacations in the Tatras at such resorts as Tatranski
Lomnica since the country's been made such a tourist center of the
satellites." Ilya Simonov didn't understand this trend of the
conversation.
"You have some knowledge of automobiles, too?"