Diplomat Volodin calls the American embassy to say that in three days the secret of the atomic bomb will be stolen in New York. The conversation overheard and recorded on tape is delivered to the “sharashka”, a research institution of the MGB system, where prisoners create a method for recognizing voices. The meaning of the novel is explained by the prisoner: “Sharashka is the highest, the best, the first circle of hell.” Volodin gives another explanation, crossing out a circle on the ground: “Do you see the circle? This is the Fatherland. This is the first circle. But the second, it is wider. This is humanity.”