The Death of a Patriot: Will Jaroslaw Kaczynski Take Brother's Political Reins?

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She has just received the call from Russia, to tell her that Andrzej Sariusz-Skapski has been identified. "He could only be recognized through his signet ring," says his daughter Izabella, who has been wearing black since the day her father died.

Izabella Sariusz-Skapski is sitting in her apartment in the old section of Krakow, twisting the silver ring on her finger. Her father gave her the ring, which is identical to the one he was wearing, when she completed her doctoral thesis. Her subject was the Katyn massacre. She can see the Wawel, Krakow's castle complex, through her kitchen window. It is where Poland's famous King Jan III Sobieski was buried, as well as independence icon Józef Pilsudski, and where Lech Kaczynski was buried over the weekend. Poland's president died a week earlier when his aircraft crashed en route to Katyn.

Near Katyn, of all places! Seventy years ago, the Soviet secret police murdered about 22,000 Poles there and at other camps. The president, his wife, senior military leaders and politicians were traveling to a commemorative ceremony in Katyn. Andrzej Sariusz-Skapski was also on board.

Izabella Sariusz-Skapska glances at the two photos in her hand. One depicts her father, Andrzej, and the second, yellow photograph is of her grandfather, Boleslaw. He too died in Katyn, 70 years before his son, when he was shot in the back of the neck at Stalin's command. Boleslaw Sariusz-Skapski was a public prosecutor, and he was 35 years old when the Russians arrested him during their 1939 invasion of the city of Dubno in eastern Poland. He was permitted to see his wife and child only once while he was a prisoner, and it was on that occasion that he gave his wife the signet ring. Their son, Andrzej, wore it his entire life, just as he was wearing it when the plane carrying the president and other senior officials crashed in heavy fog near Smolensk at 8:56 a.m. on April 10.

'The World Has Finally Acknowledged What Happened 70 Years Ago'

"For my father, the ceremony with the president was a way of putting his own father to rest," says Sariusz-Skapska.

The Sariusz-Skapskas have rented the ground floor of their five-story building out to four Arabs who run a business trading in oriental spices. When Izabella Sariusz-Skapska was walking down the stairs last week, one of the men held open the door for her and said, in fluent Polish: "Ms. Izabella, my sincere condolences. We understand you now. There was a long report about Katyn on Al-Jazeera today."

That, at least, is one bright spot for Izabella Sariusz-Skapska. "The world has finally acknowledged what happened in Katyn 70 years ago."

The government's official period of mourning came to an end on Sunday, after Kaczynski's funeral, but the tragedy will have a strong impact on Poland, at least when it comes to the struggle over the legacy of the deceased president. Will his twin brother Jaroslaw become his political successor? Last week, the shock and sadness of the tragedy brought together the Poles and the Russians, who have been divided over the Katyn issue. But will the thaw in relations last?

There was silence at the crash site near Smolensk on Friday afternoon. It was difficult to imagine the disaster that had unfolded there, in dense fog and very poor visibility, only six days earlier.

The last pieces of wreckage had been cleared away, and 76 of the 96 dead passengers had been identified. The fragments of the aircraft, a Tupolev 154-M, are now being painstakingly reassembled near the crash site.

The third flight recorder, which has now been found, is being analyzed in Warsaw.

Throughout the entire week, rumors were circulating about the circumstances of the crash. Was it really true that President Kaczynski had exerted pressure on the pilot, Arkadiusz Protasiuk, in order to force him to land the plane despite the extreme fog -- just as he had done once before, in August 2008, during the war between Russia and Georgia, as his plane approached the Georgian capital Tbilisi? The investigators say this was not the case in Smolensk, and that only the pilots' voices can be heard on the flight recorders.

The investigative commission did not reveal any of what it had learned from the flight recorders, except that the pilots' last words, as they realized what was about to happen, were so personal that it would not publish them, "for ethical reasons."

Polish Crew Made Only One Attempt to Land

On Friday evening Tatjana Anodina, the head of the aviation committee with jurisdiction over Russia and 11 other former Soviet republics, did reveal that there was neither a fire nor an explosion on board. Surprisingly, however, she rejected reports that Kaczynski's pilot made up to four attempts to land the plane near Smolensk. "It was clearly ascertained that the Polish crew made only one attempt."

Jaroslaw Kaczynski now hopes that a shadow will not fall on the memory of his deceased brother.

When the members of the government and the opposition came together at a church service on Tuesday of last week, Jaroslaw was sitting in the front row alone. The key advisors and confidants who would normally be sitting in seats around him died in the crash with his brother Lech.

The twin brothers formed a congenial political team for three decades, with Lech assuming the political offices and Jaroslaw serving as the behind-the-scenes strategist.

The only reason Jaroslaw was not on board the fateful flight is that the brothers' 83-year-old mother, who is seriously ill, is currently in a Warsaw hospital. Jaroslaw could take his brother's place in running for the country's highest office. He is now the brother of a martyr who was buried at Wawel Castle.

But will Jaroslaw survive this serious personal crisis?

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• Part 1: Will Jaroslaw Kaczynski Take Brother's Political Reins?
• Part 2: 'He Is a Man of Steel'
• Part 3: 'Eternal Victims'