Oct. 23 was Olga Romanova's last day at one store in the L'Etoile perfumechain before moving to a long-awaited job in another. She returned home - an apartment around the corner from the theaterwhere, just hours before, hundreds of people had been taken hostage - ataround 1:30 a.m. to face questions from her mother. "I asked her: 'Wherehave you been?'" Olga's mother, Antonina, said in a telephone interview.
Olga told her about the police cordons outside."We sat around for a while, drank some tea. She was saying: 'How is itpossible that they are keeping women and children in there?' Then - itwas about half past three - she said, 'So, I'll go, maybe I'll get through,maybe I will be able to talk to them, maybe they will at least releasethe children. I feel sorry for the kids.' I tried to stop her from going:I yelled at her, cried, locked the door. But she left," Antonina Romanovasaid, ending the interview last week, saying she could not answer any morequestions. Two doctors who were allowed to enter the theater on Oct. 24 carriedout the body of the first victim. The next day it was identified as thebody of Olga Romanova - a 26-year-old salesperson, who had supported herpensioner parents and disabled brother. It is unclear how Romanova entered the House of Culture - familiar toher since childhood - as it was surrounded by police, although the cordonwas weaker in the early hours of the siege. She apparently was not the only one who did; at least three otherswere reported to have gotten through police lines. Lieutenant Colonel KonstantinVasilyev was missing on the first night of the hostage crisis, and hisbody, with five bullet wounds, was found in the theater's courtyard afterthe assault, one of his friends said. A Cossack leader was reported tohave approached the theater on Oct. 25 - apparently without permissionfrom the crisis center - prompting hostage takers to begin shooting. Anotherman got through the security cordon to enter the theater several hoursbefore special forces stormed the building. He said he was looking forhis son, who was not found among the hostages. The man was beaten and shot,presumably fatally, according to former hostages, who said the Chechengunmen accused him of being an FSB agent. Some former hostages said they heard this confirmed by securityofficials. Yet Romanova will be remembered as the first victim and the only womanwho somehow got in, apparently not realizing the danger. Former hostage Mark Podlesny, a member of the "Nord-Ost" cast, said hesaw the woman enter the hall from the rear left door. "I don't know if it's true, but she looked drunk, and she spoke to[the hostage takers] sharply, something like 'Do you understand what youhave done here?'" Podlesny said. "She behaved with them as if they werenot terrorists with weapons in their hands, but as if she was arguing withthem at the market." The hostage takers suspected she was an FSB "spy," Podlesny said, andthreatened to kill her. "Go ahead and kill me," he quoted her as saying."Then she said something else, and then they took her away," Podlesny said.He said he saw a hostage taker who was inside the hall fire four or fiveshots from his Kalashnikov in the direction of the door through which Romanovahad been taken. Romanova's colleagues and friends say she was an honest, blunt andhard-working person with a strong sense of justice. "She was a fighter of sorts," said Yelena Salicheva, a store managerunder whom Romanova had worked in 2000 and 2001 and was due to begin workingwith again on Oct. 24. "There are such people, you know - something clicksand they think they can save the world. Maybe she was short on education,but she was an exceptional human being." After culinary trade school, Romanova worked at the Krasny Oktyabrchocolate factory, Salicheva said. And then she went to work for the perfumechain. Olga Fazyaullina, another manager at L'Etoile, said Romanova was akind person who saw things "in black and white" and always rushed to help."She simply could not understand how people could lie, how there couldbe injustice," Fazyaullina said. Natalya Shchedina, a highschool classmate of Romanova who re-established ties with her last winter, also said Romanova's response tothe hostage taking was not out of character. She recalled that Romanovaoften had forced herself into conflict situations, trying to resolve thedispute. Shchedrina appealed via the Internet for help for Romanova's parentsand brother, who, without her salary have only their combined monthly pensionsand social payments of 5,000 rubles ($157) to live on. The appeal was postedon the Vazhno.ru Web site, which has gathered information about the hostages.From there it prompted a group of Russian emigres in the United Statesto start a U.S. tax-deductable foundation to gather donations for the familiesof Romanova and others. Andrew Mogilyansky, the organizer of the Nord-Ost Fund for Victims andHostages of Moscow Terror, said Monday that about $30,000 in donationshas been collected in the past two weeks. And about the same amount hasbeen pledged, pending the fund's registration as a charity, which he saidshould be finalized within days. "As soon as we get registration papers, we will begin applying toWestern corporate donors," Mogilyansky said by telephone from Bensalem,Pennsylvania. The fund will also then begin distributing the money, hesaid. Shchedrina, who is on the fund's board, said she had received about$1,500, mostly from abroad, in direct donations for Romanova's family.
She said many people responded to her appeal in Russia as well. "I amamazed by how many people have responded," Shchedrina said. "Absolute strangerscome, give money and ask to remain anonymous."
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