by Niles Kovach
“Erstens essen wir," said the driver next to me.
I understood this. Four years of high school German left me competent in simple conversation. I almost replied in the same language, but something stopped me. Vasily knew so much about me, did he know this, too? Or was this something I could keep from him, possibly to my advantage? I knew I was going to need any advantage I could get. Thought and decision took only a moment. "I don't understand," I said.
"He said we will eat first," said Vasily. He leaned forward from the back. "We know a quiet place where we can talk.”
I hoped they did not notice my shudder. I did not want these men to know that I feared them because I had decided to base my defense on ignorance. "Talking" did not sound like a pleasant prospect.
"Misha's English is not very good," said Vasily. "Is there another language you can use that we all know?”
"No. Sorry.”
"What about Russian?”
"Sorry. I don't know Russian.”
"You must know Russian. Your mother is an emigre. Surely, she taught you Russian.”
I groped for a response. "I'm not fluent. My Russian is practically useless. My mother gave up on me years ago.”
"Good. We'll use Russian." Vasily leaned back in his seat.
The decision had been made, but no language was used for another half hour. The car made its way across the city with silent occupants. Enveloped in a luxury I had never seen before, surrounded by men I instinctively knew were not safe, I felt small and insignificant, imprisoned in a fast-moving cage of power and wealth, in circumstances I did not understand.
After one of many turns, the car glided down a curving driveway in front of an older building, not as tall as the skyscrapers crowded around it, and stopped under a long awning that stretched from the front door of an exclusive restaurant. A uniformed footman reached for my door, but Vasily was out of the car and helping me out before the man could reach the handle. I thought of screaming, but had no time to decide. I was marched into the building quickly, Vasily gripping my arm tightly, while the other man who had been in the back seat walked ahead to arrange for a table. We were shown to a table immediately. It was the only table in an elegant little room. How nice. How private. I debated the possibility of running out of the room. But I could be mistaken, imagining things. Wouldn't I look a fool running out of a posh restaurant in downtown Chicago? And then where would I go? How would I get back to the South Side at that hour? I didn't even have a dime for a phone call.
Our table was centered in a semi-circular booth, very cozy. I was helped into the right side of it; Vasily sat on my left, his arm around my shoulder. The other two men blocked the left end of the booth. I considered slinking under the table, but Vasily held me very close, so close that I could feel the gun under his coat, the one I had guessed at in the library. He was letting me know for sure. Threatening without speaking, smiling at me. I returned to ignorance-as-best-defense and pretended not to notice. I smiled back at him.
The third man explained to me in passable Russian that this was his favorite restaurant in Chicago and would I please allow him to order for me. He introduced himself as Louis, said proudly that he was French, and treated me to a light conversation that I found easy to follow. He was gallant, jolly, and warm. He had dark curly hair and darker eyes that changed intensity according to the subjects we discussed, none of them important. I began to like him and to doubt that I had any reason to be afraid. Then I glanced at the driver, the man Vasily had called Misha. I noticed his expression as he filled my glass again with the incredible wine we were drinking. Chateau-something, by Rothschild-somebody. Like liquid candy. Not a hard, too-sweet, obvious candy, but a subtle one, warm, enticing, and melting. Misha was watching me carefully, and I remembered that I was afraid, that there was reason to be, and that I had decided to pretend that I wasn't. This was not difficult, since the wine was affecting me, making me warm and comfortable despite my grim situation.
But I did not like Misha. He had a polished and beautiful exterior that nonetheless suggested hidden menace. Like an iceberg, he seemed most dangerous beneath the surface. He was as handsome as the other two, and maybe more, blonde, blue-eyed, well-built. Unlike them, there was nothing likable about him. His effect was immediately chilling, his politeness clipped, form-only, devoid of the human compassion that originally spawned all forms of etiquette. One would not forget such a man, but one would want to. He did not look at me, he looked inside me. Even more, he invaded me. My response was instinctive. The more he probed, the more I did my best to conceal. He gave me more than a few mental shudders.
A young guy in a suit came to the table and spoke to Misha in German. I pretended ignorance, but was able to catch most of it.
"Who is the girl?" said the man.
"You tell us," replied Misha.
"Frank will want to know what your up to. What should I tell him?”
"Tell him I sense a threat that I will take care of.”
"I'm not so sure," said Vasily. "She may be what she appears to be." (This was not very clear to me. My grasp of the conditional and subjunctive was, and still is, shaky at best.)
"Let's not be hasty," said the man. "Let me see what Frank has to say." He turned to me and asked in English, "May I ask your name, Miss?” "Alexandra Dolnikov.” He repeated it and left.
The man's visit seemed to mark a change in the atmosphere of the little room. Louis' charm and the warmth of the wine receded before an onslaught of questions from Misha. His questions were politely phrased, in perfect Russian that was nonetheless not native to him, but each made me tremble. He knew much already, but I could not be sure how much. I did my best to appear thick, innocent, and uninvolved, without actually lying, since lies create a labyrinth that can be deadly to the liar.
"Vasily says you are looking for an icon," he said. "Have you found it?”
"No." I risked a few more words. "I'm not looking for it. I told Father Paul I would talk to Boris Nikitin about it. He thought Boris might know. That's all. Really.”
"Have you known Grayson long?”
"I don't know him,” I stammered. "I...Father Paul said he offered to buy the icon, so I asked Mr. Grayson some questions. That's all. Really.”
"Why did the priest ask you for help?”
"Oh, I don't know. Because I went to school with Boris, I suppose.”
"Why did he tell you about Grayson's offer?” I shook my head. I did not understand.
He put on his worst “being patient” look. "You are twenty years old. Why are you, of all people, trusted with such things?”
I had no answer for that. Why does anybody tell somebody something, anything? What makes people drop bits of information, as though leaking them from a bucket, for others to pick up willy-nilly? And why do I keep all those bits that are dropped in front of me?
”What did Grayson tell you?" came the next salvo from cold corner.
I was still wondering how I had come to be young and trusted at the same time, so that this question caught me off guard. I answered it automatically. "He said, ‘Tell them I'll have the money tomorrow. Tell them.’”
Louis broke the tense silence after a few seconds. In German, he asked Misha, "What do you think?” "She's lying," said Misha.
It sounded like a death sentence, and I involuntarily blanched. Misha, who was watching me carefully, noticed and raised his eyebrows in surprise and recognition. His meaning could not have been clearer if he had shouted it in perfect English. He had not known that I understood German, but he knew now. And he considered it proof that I was lying.
Before I could further incriminate myself, a short, round, man with bulging eyes came up to the table. He spoke to Misha. "She's clear.”
"No, she's not.”
"As far as we're concerned, she is.”
"But it is my concern that counts most here.”
"Yes, well, let me see if I can cool the situation, all right?”
Misha answered with an icy stare.
&nb
sp; The new man was slightly nervous, but seemed to know what he had to do and was determined to do it. He turned to me. I was somehow comforted by the coffee stains on his shirt and tie. Reminded me of my Dad somehow.
”Miss Dolnikov, my name is Frank Cardova. I'm sure you'd like to be going wouldn't you? May I take you home?”
"Yes, please." I whispered it
Nobody moved. Frank Cardova stared back at Misha. The room seemed filled with explosive vapor, waiting for a spark. It was the moment of disaster, when silence gives the boundary between peace and violence.
But the moment passed. Misha gave the slightest nod to Vasily, who left his place and extended his hand to me, helping me, almost pulling me out of that booth. Cardova propelled me out of the restaurant in much the same way that Vasily had dragged me in. After my initial relief, I wondered if I was wise to trust yet another man I had never met. I looked at his receding hairline. He would eventually be quite bald. Papa is certainly not bald, I thought, and he is older, so why does this guy remind me of him?
"What the hell were you doing in there, girl?” he asked me when we were safely in what I guessed to be a rental car on the way to my apartment.
I wanted to say "Trying to stay alive," but I was still not sure about this man. "Having dinner," was all I could manage.
His googly eyes swiveled off the road and onto me. "I see," he said. "Bit of a dare-devil, are we? Like taking risks? Why not get a burger and eat it on a subway track during rush hour.”
"Who are you?" I asked. "And who are those guys."
"I told you my name, and those guys are poison. Stay away from them."
"I know your name, but what are you? Are you one of them?”
And why are you so much like Papa?
"I'm their babysitter, so to speak. I'm not one of them, but I am beginning to wonder what, exactly, you are."
"You all seem to know everything. I don't know anything."
"That's a very good policy," he said. "I advise you to stick to it."
"I will. I'm through with this…. whatever this is."
"Glad to hear it, now tell me all about it, my dear.”
"I said I'm through.”
And I’m not your dear.
"Just tell me everything, the truth."
His voice carried authority, again like your grandfather, so I told him.
"So Grayson thinks it's him and he thinks it's the money," he said when I had finished, more to himself than to me. "That one's a bad egg, young lady. Stupid move on your part, going over there. You drew a lot of attention to yourself.”
"Grayson thinks what's the money?"
"Nothing. Don't worry about it."
I tried a different tack, curiosity and a sense of security momentarily pushing my earlier resolutions aside. "Is it money?"
"No, of course not." Cardova was again speaking more to himself. "He owes some people a lot of money and thinks he can save himself. He's wrong. They aren't the people and that's not the reason."
He drove and I watched the city slide by until we were parked in front of my apartment. I had not told him where it was. I was beginning to wonder if there was anybody who didn't know where I lived.
"Listen," said Cardova, "Those guys are hazardous to your health, eh? Especially Grayson. Don't go near him again."
This was a surprise. "I thought Grayson was pretty harmless. I mean, compared to Misha."
"It depends on circumstances. Grayson's circumstances are desperate and he knows it. That makes him dangerous and unpredictable. Nasty combination. Plus, you never want to stand around at the target end of a firing range, and that's what I'd call a twenty-five foot circle around Grayson right now. Misha, as you call him, is just plain dangerous, but predictable. Everything he does has a reason. I'll do what I can to keep you out of his sights. You do your part and you'll be all right."
"So who is Charlemagne?" A sudden memory brought it to my mind; impulse asked the question.
In the light of the street lamp we were parked under, I could see Cardova's total surprise. "Where did you hear that?"
"Grayson said it. Or he asked it. He said something about 'it' being Charlemagne. Or something.”
"Did you tell them that?"
"No. I just now remembered it."
"Well, forget it. Completely. Wipe it away. Don't ever say the word again. Got it?"
"Got it."
CHAPTER TEN