The Troika Dolls

by Miranda Darling

  He smiled and with clean, deft hands he unfolded a piece of paper that had been sitting on Stevie’s table.

  ‘This is the Murmeli Post, our sanatorium newsletter. It contains details of activities, weather forecasts and inspirational quotes. Enjoy your breakfast.’

  The view up the gorge was breathtaking. The tips of the mountains were glowing a deep dawn red against the still-black sky, like fingers of lava clawing their way down into the valley.

  Red sky in morning, shepherd’s warning, thought Stevie. She glanced down at the newsletter. A reminder that a Nordic skiing excursion would take place in the valley that afternoon was followed by the weather forecast: a heavy grey cloud with falling flakes. The Murmeli Post was expecting a blizzard, and temperatures of –5 degrees Celsius. So much for thoughts of spring.

  Stevie was about to wander over to sample the delights of the buffet when a waiter appeared with a huge silver tray.

  ‘Seine Früstück, Fräulein Duveen.’

  ‘But I haven’t ordered anything,’ Stevie said, surprised. ‘I was actually thinking of browsing the buffet.’

  ‘The buffet is only for blue guests.’

  Blue guests?

  Then Stevie caught sight of her green bracelet and understood. ‘Well, what are green guests given for breakfast?’ she asked cheerfully.

  ‘Green is one of our more restricted menus,’ said the waiter, placing the tray on the table. There was a glass of deep purple juice, foaming at the top, and a small silver bowl of sliced beetroot. A dish of fermented goat curd stood beside it. Stevie looked at it in horror.

  ‘Guten apetit.’

  ‘Hardly possible,’ Stevie muttered. She caught the waiter as he left. ‘A pot of coffee please, and you had better bring some cream for it, too.’

  ‘Coffee is not permitted for the green guests.’ And with those devastating words, the waiter bustled off.

  The wait for Henning seemed endless. Stevie passed the time ignoring her breakfast and observing the other guests.

  There was a table of overweight Germans—two men, three women—all with gingery blond hair. They were tucking into mountains of hard-boiled eggs, celery and huge bowls of stewed fruits. They were wearing red wrist-bands.

  An elderly lady, pin-thin, sat alone by the window. She was dressed in black, with a fat rope of pearls around her neck, and several wrapped around her wrists. She seemed to be drinking only juices and wore a purple band.

  Three women, all with incredible hair and high-heeled knee-high boots strode in and sat down. Their cushiony lips and ageless faces suggested various improvements had been made to the original model. They spoke fluent French to the waiter and another language among themselves. Stevie guessed they were Lebanese.

  Stevie was looking for Eastern Europeans. They were not difficult to spot. At a large table just to her left sat three men, all in jogging suits. Two were dark and built like doorstops. They both wore heavy rings, and thick gold necklaces and bracelets.

  The third was tall and ginger-haired, with red stubble and a huge chest that ran seamlessly into his stomach like Hadrian’s Wall. Stevie silently nicknamed him ‘the Barbarian’. The three were demolishing a huge breakfast of plates of meat, cheese and smoked fish.

  Dragoman was not among them—at least not as far as she could tell from the photos Josie had sent, and the description she had given.

  Then a fourth man appeared, his back to Stevie. She started.

  He was wearing a mauve jogging suit, shiny and rather tight. Not a tall man by any stretch, but he was as stocky as a barrel. He seemed to be fighting a battle against hair loss, the bleached hair plugs visible from the back. The man was covered in gold and diamond jewellery and wore large white running shoes in the American style. Three fawn pugs ran snuffling at his heels.

  This was definitely not the dagger-sharp silhouette of Felix Dragoman. This was something else entirely.

  The men at the table stopped eating and stood immediately to greet him. They spoke Russian, but Stevie could make out several accents—Romanian? Hungarian? possibly Turkish . . . ? They called him Bozz.

  This wasn’t Dragoman—but who was he?

  One of the men hurriedly pulled out a chair and the Boss sat. He turned in profile to light his cigar and, with a jolt, Stevie recognised him—the lips were unmistakable: they looked almost as if his mouth had been turned inside out, leaving his lips like small, uncooked sausages. Those were not the lips the man had been born with. He wore huge wraparound sunglasses with gold rims, rather like an ageing star of B-grade action movies, or a Southeast Asian dictator. Stevie might have been tempted to giggle had she not known just how dangerous Heinrich— or Heini—Hahanyan was.

  Stevie watched him fawning over his dogs.

  Sometimes she wished her mind wasn’t populated with faces like his. Surely it changed you, to even hold the impression of his features in your mind, knowing who he was and what he did? Perhaps it was the catalogue of all the faces that brought her her nightmares . . .

  ‘Givenchy, kak ya tibya liubliu! Bacon, ah?’ Givenchy, the pug, responded with frenzied licking of the human’s lips. Heini’s voice was surprisingly soft, even feminine. He fed the dog small morsels with his neighbour’s fork.

  At his feet, one of the other pugs was indiscreetly licking his balls. Stevie watched as he too, his work done, jumped up and began licking his master’s lips. It was enough to put one off one’s beetroot breakfast, thought Stevie.

  ‘Tseluyu, Calvin Klein!’ Heini fondled the ball-licking dog and looked down for the third.

  ‘Shto ti dyelayesh, Adam?’

  In reply, Adam lifted his little pug leg and peed on the chair. Heini scooped him up onto his lap to join his two friends.

  At that moment, Henning arrived, freshly shaven and smelling rather inexplicably and intoxicatingly of leather and roses.

  ‘Thank goodness, Henning. You took your time,’ Stevie grumbled crossly.

  Henning was brandishing a copy of the Murmeli Post. ‘Sleep is the bedrock of good sense. It says so right here.’

  Stevie only frowned. Henning glanced at her breakfast tray and his eyes twinkled. ‘They’ve got you off the coffee have they?’

  ‘Order a pot of coffee will you, for heaven’s sake. Stop fooling around.’

  A coffee pot arrived. Henning poured a cup and Stevie slid under the floor-length tablecloth with it. She emerged a moment later clutching her ballet slipper.

  ‘Here it is! I don’t know how I could have lost it,’ she exclaimed. She handed her empty cup to Henning.

  He lifted the coffee pot. ‘Lost the other shoe?’

  ‘Listen, Henning, there’s no time for fun and games. There’s a table of thuggish types speaking Russian—Heini Hahanyan seems to be their boss. But I don’t see Dragoman.’

  Henning reached for Stevie’s beetroot juice. ‘Where?’ he asked mildly.

  ‘Your four o’clock. The man who looks like Donatella Versace— mauve tracksuit.’

  Henning sipped the purple muck. ‘This isn’t bad, you know.’

  Stevie glared at him. Henning downed the juice then turned and summoned a waiter.

  ‘Another beetroot juice, please. Miss Duveen is rather fond of it.’

  Henning grabbed an eyeful of Heini as he spun back towards Ste-vie. ‘Who is Heini Hahanyan?’

  Stevie scooted close. ‘Once upon a time, they shot men like Hahanyan for profiteering. He specialises in swindling weapons, aid money, medicines, food supplies, anything provided by Western countries or multinational agencies to war-or disaster-torn areas.’ She risked a surreptitious sip of Henning’s coffee. ‘Sometimes it’s taking payment for contracts he doesn’t fulfil, sometimes it’s supplying faulty or substandard or fake goods, or even just walking off with a plane-load of medicines meant for refugee camps and then reselling them to other needy countries. The man is a gorgon. He also specialises in torturing and murdering anyone who goes after him, as two unfortunate young Angolan journalists found out in
the 1980s.’

  ‘So he’s never in the news.’ Henning refilled his coffee cup.

  Stevie shook her head. ‘Britain’s libel laws keep him out of the English papers, but you can read about his horrors elsewhere. Of course, his bloody profits are carefully laundered to avoid any excess profits tax anyone might be tempted to levy.’

  ‘Sounds—and looks—hideous,’ said Henning. ‘He’s wearing a blue band.’

  ‘What do you think blue means? Apart from the licence to buffet that is.’

  ‘I went scouting in the spa this morning. I spotted a chart with the colour codes and I was about to take a look when I was interrupted by a nurse—actually a rather attractive one.’ Henning gave her a wicked glint. ‘I’m sure we could get back there again.’

  ‘Is that where you’ve been?’ Stevie asked rather sharply.

  ‘Jealous?’ he teased.

  ‘Hardly.’ Stevie turned her head away and scanned the room.

  Henning seemed always to be able to read her mind. It was disconcerting to say the least.

  Stevie pushed back her chair, ready to leave. Henning laid a quick hand on her arm. She followed his silent prompting.

  Two men had entered and were crossing the room. The second was tall and pale with black hair. He wore a jacket with a bulge under the left arm and carried a small glass bottle and a white handkerchief. But it was the first man that made Stevie catch her breath.

  He was small—maybe five foot six—and very slim, with dark blond hair carefully blow-dried back off his forehead. His skin was very tanned and unnaturally taut, almost like that of a burn victim. He wore large glasses with caramel-coloured lenses, an orange cashmere rollneck and an Afghani shawl tossed over his shoulder.

  He was smoking a cigarillo in a short ebony holder and Stevie noticed a large ruby sunk in gold on his pinky finger. On his feet was a pair of monogrammed slippers in red velvet.

  The man turned to the window as he passed and Stevie saw it: a bald patch in the shape of a perfect crescent moon.

  Felix Dragoman.

  Dragoman and the dark-haired man shadowing him stopped at the table of ogres and spoke to Heini Hahanyan. Dragoman declined an invitation to sit.

  They exchanged a few words then Heini put out his hand. Dragoman hesitated a moment and then shook it limply. Heini chuckled and spoke in Russian. His voice was loud and Stevie, intent on the Murmeli Post, could hear him clearly.

  ‘You look younger every time I see you—a miracle it is, heh!’

  Dragoman nodded curtly, his mouth pursed, and moved to sit down at a small table by the window. His shadow opened the bottle and wet the handkerchief with its contents.

  As Dragoman wiped his hands with the kerchief, Stevie realised the bottle contained rubbing alcohol. The man was a germophobe, Josie had said, obviously afraid of the dangers of human contact.

  A waiter—Stevie now noticed they all wore white gloves— appeared with a tall glass of dark green liquid and a plate of raw meat. Dragoman’s bracelet was black.

  He carefully turned the pages of a large book, its cover encased in plastic. Stevie squinted to read the title: Woodblock Etchings of the Bubonic Plagues of the Dark Ages, Volume I.

  Stevie turned quickly back to Henning.

  ‘According to my friendly nurse,’ he was saying, ‘Dragoman has taken the whole west wing of the castle. I suppose clinics and sanatoriums are a good way to launder money, meet discreetly with business partners, and hide other illegal activities.’

  ‘And from what I hear he makes good and frequent use of their services.’ Stevie slid her hand towards Henning’s coffee cup, her eyes on the waiter. ‘Apparently he is kept young and virile by injections of monkey hormones.’

  Henning raised his eyebrows sceptically.

  Stevie nodded. ‘Welcome to the weird world of beauty, Henning— there’s not much people won’t do to stay young forever.’

  ‘I wonder what the story is with this Heini.’ Henning looked over at the man in mauve, now busy teaching his pugs to beg for thin slices of Emmenthal cheese. ‘Are they in league? He doesn’t seem Dragoman’s type.’

  But Stevie’s gaze remained fixed on Dragoman. ‘We need a way to get close to him.’

  A nurse came to collect Stevie for her first treatment: a detoxifying immersion that was basically a scaldingly hot steam bath. Stevie followed her obediently down into the treatment rooms, followed by Henning who was planning to stickybeak when the chance arose.

  Stevie shed her robe and slippers and entered the glass-walled hammam.

  Inside she could hardly breathe or see, the steam was so thick. The air felt like semolina as it entered her lungs and she felt herself become light-headed. She lay back against the granite bench and closed her eyes.

  She thought of Anya. Was she in the sanatorium, too? She shuddered and hoped Dragoman had not killed her.

  The thing now was to make Dragoman believe that the men in Moscow had betrayed him. As she began to perspire, Stevie prayed for luck and courage.

  The same nurse tapped on the door and Stevie floated out, her mind foggy. The nurse stood her under the huge water bucket they had seen the day before and tugged smartly on the rope.

  Before she could realise what was happening, twenty litres of just-melted snow cascaded over Stevie’s pink and naked body, bringing her smartly back to her senses and covering her skin in burning pins and needles.

  She gasped in shock and looked around for Henning, who was nowhere to be seen. Why couldn’t he have been the tired and emotional starlet, she thought crossly.

  Stevie snatched her robe from the nurse and stalked off. Fortunately, petulance was firmly in-character for Mademoiselle Duveen, toxicomaniac.

  Traipsing through the corridors, Stevie found she felt surprisingly better, considering the violence that had been done to her. She found Henning in the reception area, drinking lemongrass tea and flipping through French Vogue. She glowered at him.

  ‘You’d better have done your bit,’ she hissed.

  Henning opened his navy cord blazer and Stevie saw the colour-coded schedule tucked neatly into the inside pocket.

  Henning chuckled. ‘Sanatorium life obviously suits you—your cheeks are rosy pink like a little girl’s.’

  ‘That’s from the pain.’

  ‘Look, here,’ Stevie pointed to the schedule. ‘It says “black, blue, red and yellow, 12.00 Sonnenbad”. That’s where we’ll find him.’

  They were sitting in the vast circular room they had seen the night before, with the turquoise curtains and the polished hexagonal tables. Henning looked out of the window. It was plummeting great snowflakes.

  ‘How long has it been, would you say, Stevie, since you’ve seen the sun?’

  ‘Forever.’ Stevie was sitting in an old armchair by the window in her bathrobe and sunglasses. She lit a cigarette and watched the snow for a moment.

  ‘We seem to be somehow stuck in the heart of winter.’

  Two of the florid Germans, dressed in heavy corduroy and walking boots, sat drinking tea in a corner by a massive floral arrangement. A giant poodle gnawed a rawhide bone. Apart from them the place was deserted.

  One of Heini’s men walked by, holding the three pugs on leashes as they scurried and snuffled at various objects of interest—the umbrella stand, a power point, the porter’s polished shoe.

  Stevie sat forward, her eyes on the henchman’s vanishing back. ‘It’s a matter of grabbing Dragoman’s attention, casually. We can hardly go up to him at the juice bar and just mention, oh by the way, we’ve heard a man named “killer” from Moscow is looking for you.’

  ‘No,’ Henning agreed. ‘But it can’t be too subtle. We haven’t got the time for that. Dragoman won’t be staying long.’

  Through the triple-height windows, Stevie and Henning had a good view of the road, winding down through a pine forest to the distant village. The postmaster drove up in his little yellow truck, a huge mail sack just visible in the back. A horse and rider clip-clopp
ed down the road, the horse’s rump steaming in the cold. Everything else was still and quiet.

  Something moved unexpectedly amongst the tree trunks—a dark shape flitting—and was gone. Stevie scanned the hillside. The white blanket of snow turned every tree and rock that stood against it black. An animal? Surely it had been much too big . . .

  It was ten to twelve and Stevie and Henning, in bathrobes and slippers, trundled down to the Sonnenbad. They were each given a purple pair of goggles as they entered the sunbathing room.

  It was large, with a smooth granite floor, floor-to-ceiling windows that jutted out over the gorge and faced down the valley. The room was flooded with UV light and patients lay scattered about in green-and-white striped deck chairs.

  Stevie spotted Dragoman sitting alone. His shadow was standing at the back wall, also in a robe and still carrying the bottle of rubbing alcohol. Heini had not yet arrived.

  She took a deck chair directly in front of him and shed her robe, revealing only tiny bikini bottoms and no top. Stevie wasn’t quite sure what she would do once she had Dragoman’s attention but she figured it would be a start. She stretched luxuriously.

  A quick glance sideways revealed that Dragoman wasn’t taking the slightest bit of notice.

  Henning, however—

  Stevie blushed furiously and lay down quickly.

  Henning settled himself next to her and pulled out a copy of a Hollywood trade rag.

  ‘Can you believe they sell Variety at the concierge desk?’ He waved the publication at Stevie. ‘We can read what they’re telling everyone about Monkeys in Paradise.’

  ‘It’s all just a conspiracy against my talent, Henning. Anyone with half a brain can see that.’

  Henning kept his attention fixed on the newspaper. He sounded bored. ‘Darling, you passed out in a pool of your own vomit.’

  Stevie frowned under her goggles. ‘So?’

  ‘On set.’

  ‘So?’ she repeated, louder.

  ‘Twice in one week. You can see their point.’

  ‘Fascists,’ Stevie declared, examining her nails. ‘Studios are all the same—it’s all just money, money, money. What about art?!’