THE JUNE MORNING was bright and clear. It was already growing warm. A gauzy veil of gas fumes shimmered over Moscow, giving the city the steamy illusion of a tropical capital. The trees in the little park in Sverdlov Square were in full leaf, a bright splash of green providing a sylvan background to the outline of the Sobakin Tower as seen from the Kremlin. Apparachiki taking an early lunch hour and babushkas with swaddled infants strolled among the trees, snacking on ice cream and greasy pyshki doughnuts served hot from the fryer by pavement vendors, oblivious to the thick tension in the Arsenal building in the Kremlin, where the Politburo was beginning its regular Thursday morning meeting.

The Politburo meets in a medium-sized room which sits at the heart of the vast Soviet empire like a spider at the center of its web. The room has white marble walls and is bare of any decoration except for a portrait of Lenin, his profile gazing stonily in the direction of the onion-shaped dome of St. Basil’s Cathedral across Red Square. Around the long oak conference table, its surface polished like a mirror, twelve of the men who ruled half the planet uneasily waited for Fyedorenko to take his place at the head of the table. In front of each member was a blank note pad and pen, an ashtray, and according to his preference, a carafe of ice water or kvas, the pungent brown drink made from fermented rye bread that is the Coca-Cola of Russia. In one corner sat three stenographers ready to take down every word. After the meeting their notes would be compared and a definitive transcript would be distributed among the participants. In the opposite corner, two KGB operators readied a tape recorder. The doorway was blocked by two six-footers at rigid attention. They wore the green uniform of the Kremlin Guard, their leather holsters gleaming with polish.

The twelve glanced uncomfortably around the room avoiding each other’s eyes. With the Byzantine instinct for the jugular that had taken each of them to the very pinnacle of power, they collectively sensed that this was to be no ordinary meeting. From time to time one or another of them would furtively glance at the empty Penal Chair, at the far end of the table, hoping that wherever the axe fell, his head wouldn’t be under it. If the party secretary had planned to increase their uneasiness by making them wait, he had certainly achieved his end.