“When will you know?”

“Gorbachev is just going to say yes or no, then go back to sleep. Call me in an hour.”

Tanya hung up. She did not know what to think. Clearly Jaruzelski was ready to clamp down, arrest all the Solidarity activists, throw civil liberties out the window, and reimpose his dictatorship, just as he had in 1981. It was what always happened when Communist countries got the smell of freedom in their nostrils. But Gorbachev said the old days were over. Was it true?

Poland was about to find out.

Tanya stared at the phone in an agony of suspense. What should she tell Danuta? She did not want to panic everyone. But maybe they should be warned of Jaruzelski’s intentions.

Danuta said to her: “Now you’re looking glum, too. What did your brother say?”

Tanya hesitated, then decided to say that nothing had been decided, which was the simple truth. “Jaruzelski called Gorbachev but hasn’t reached him yet.”

They continued to watch the screens. Solidarity was winning everything. So far, the Communists had not won a single contested seat. More results just confirmed the early signs. Landslide was hardly a strong enough word: it was more like a tsunami.

In the room over the café, euphoria mingled with fear. The gradual shift in power for which they had hoped was now out of the question. One of two things would happen in the next twenty-four hours. The Communists might again seize power by force. Or, if they did not, they were finished forever.

Tanya forced herself to wait a full hour before calling Moscow again.

“They talked,” Dimka said. “Gorbachev refused to back a crackdown.”

“Thank heaven,” said Tanya. “So what is Jaruzelski going to do?”

“Backpedal just as fast as he can.”

“Really?” Tanya could hardly believe such good news.

“He’s out of options.”

“I suppose he is.”

“Enjoy the celebration.”

Tanya hung up and spoke to Danuta. “There will be no violence,” she said. “Gorbachev has ruled it out.”

“Oh, my God,” said Danuta in a voice that mingled incredulity with jubilation. “We really have won, haven’t we?”

“Yes,” said Tanya, with a feeling of satisfaction and hope that went all the way to the bottom of her heart. “This is the beginning of the end.”

• • •

It was high summer and sweltering hot in Bucharest on July 7. Dimka and Natalya were there with Gorbachev for a Warsaw Pact summit. Their host was Nicolae Ceausescu, the mad dictator of Romania.

The most important item on the agenda was “the Hungary problem.” Dimka knew it had been put on the list by the East German leader, Erich Honecker. Hungary’s liberalization threatened all the other Warsaw Pact countries, by calling attention to the repressive nature of their unreformed regimes, but it was worst for East Germany. Hundreds of East Germans on holiday in Hungary were leaving their tents and walking into the woods and through holes in the old fence to Austria and freedom. The roads leading from Lake Balaton to the frontier were littered with their tinny Trabant and Wartburg cars, abandoned without regret. Most had no passports, but that did not matter: they were transported to West Germany, where they were automatically given citizenship and helped to settle. No doubt they soon replaced their old cars with more reliable and comfortable Volkswagens.