Chapter 42 - Satisfying the Russian Men
The next morning was house hunting time. At 10am Gale took the black Mercedes and picked up the Gromstovs. Gwen, with Guignard driving the white Mercedes, picked up the Rodstras. The black car headed for Kiawah Island and the white car headed for Sullivan's Island. Early that morning, before Gwen kicked him and Roger out of the house, Jinny told her he thought the Russians wanted separate houses. They were friends, but not close enough to want to share vacation places. That’s what Gwen hoped to hear, because of course she would get two commissions rather than one. Both cars had the multiple property listing printouts for their respective island.
Gwen had cut an unusual deal with a friend of hers who was a licensed real estate agent and broker. Three factors contributed to the deal. The first was that the market was in the depths of depression, and the Charleston upscale end of it was as bad as anyone with a long memory could remember. The second was, cash was king. And guess who had a dufflebag of cash? The third was Gwen’s friend was in poor health and not very active in the biz. Gwen had turned the tables on the usual sharing of commission fees. Her friend would act as official agent and broker, with the deals happening under her license. For this she would get 1% of the price. Gwen would do all the legwork, paperwork, and deal-making, and for this Gwen would get the remainder of the commission, whatever percentage she could wrangle from the buyers. They would go after properties for which her friend had the listing, which in this glutted market, were quite a few. So Gwen had stood the usual arrangement on its head, getting the lion’s share of the commission rather than just a finder’s fee. Part of the deal was Gwen’s statement to her friend that more buyers of the same type may be on their way.
The two Russian couples were excited. They’d had a good time the day before, and now they were approaching a peak in the adventure, property ownership in the Unites States. Gale and Gwen noticed that both Constantine and Henric had climbed into the cars carrying small tote bags with Charleston Place Hotel machine embroidered on the side, and they wondered what was in the bags. Probably it wasn’t donuts. If Jinny had been carrying the bags, they might’ve thought donuts, but not with these two guys. Gale and Gwen got the impression that Constantine and Henric were not going to play a lot of games with the house hunting effort.
Gwen’s friend had four listings on Sullivan’s and eight listings on Kiawah. Constantine sat in the front seat next to Guignard, while Slevov was next to Gwen in the back. As Constantine got his first view of Sullivan’s Island, Slevov looked through the file folder with the property descriptions in it. Guignard kept Constantine occupied with questions about his shooting party the day before. After ten minutes of studying the papers, Slevov handed one set to Gwen and put the rest back in the folder. She smiled a smile that Gwen understood without the need of words. Slevov had found their home away from home. Simple. Gwen gave the address to Guignard, and a few minutes later they pulled up in back. They were at the back of the house, because the front of the house was beach. They got out of the car and stood looking at the four stories, built on stilt pilings. The stucco was a shade of azure, the standing seam metal roof was beige, the porches and railings running around the house on two stories were natural wood, and the landscaping was lush.
Slevov said to her husband, “This is the place you wanted, isn’t it dear?” He smiled at her, took her by the hand, and led the way inside after Gwen unlocked the doors. The inside was empty of furniture. Constantine climbed a spiral staircase to the top floor and went out on the oceanside deck. He stood looking out at the horizon, feeling the sun on his face and arms, smelling a new smell. It was the smell of home. Slevov spent time in the kitchen and the dining room. She didn’t say anything, just hugged Gwen.
Guignard appeared and asked if they wanted to see the wine cellar. Gwen looked at the file folder and, sure enough, there was a description of the two story, 10,000 bottle capacity, environmentally controlled wine cellar. One story was devoted entirely to storage, the other had storage, but also had a circular built-in table that ran 180 degrees around the house, facing outwards through curvilinear glass to the ocean. They sat at the table and, in unison, thought, 'Yeah, I could spend some time here, sipping a good burgundy.' Constantine took them back up to the top story deck, where he turned to Gwen and said, “You told me I can sit out here in February, is that right?” Gwen nodded. “Then this is what I want. This is the place.” He turned to Slevov. She nodded.
One down, one to go.
When the black Mercedes stopped at the gate of one of the Kiawah developments, Helstof wondered what was going on. Gale showed her real estate pass, and was waved through, explaining what a gated community was. Instead of heading directly to one of the eight properties in the file folder, Gale took the turn to The Sanctuary Hotel. Her intuition told her it was the type of place that would play on the Gromstov’s sensibilities. The valet took the car keys, and they entered the lobby. The lobby went from one side of the structure all the way through to the other, where it faced out to the ocean. Gale led them out onto the oceanfront patio. A bar waiter appeared out of nowhere, and Gale ordered four sweet teas. With drinks in hand they walked around to the pool area, through the seashore garden, and onto the beach. Henric breathed deeply and looked out beyond the waves. Maybe he was trying to see the harbor of St. Barths. They returned to the lobby where they finished their drinks and then climbed the wide curving staircase to the restaurant level. Gale asked them to wait for a moment, and disappeared into the kitchen. She knew the maître d’. A minute later she reappeared and motioned to them to follow her. In the kitchen, George, the maître d’, introduced them to Connie, the sous chef. Connie led them to a prep table where she offered them samples of antipastos that were on the menu that night. She pulled the cork on a bottle of Prosecco and poured five glasses. Delicious. George asked if they would be staying for dinner, and Gale said, “Next time.” Henric asked where they got their fish from, and Connie pointed out the window. “Right out there,” she said. Helstof looked at her empty wine glass.
Soon they were back in the car, sitting outside property number one. Then they looked at property number two, and then number three, and then number four. Henric and Helstof decided to purchase property number seven, so Gale had to work a lot harder than Gwen. However the result was the same….success. This property had its own private deepwater dock on the backside of the island, and that’s what Henric wanted. He wanted his own sailboat. On the way back into town Gale stopped at the Charleston Marina and introduced Henric to the owner of Charleston Yachts. Henric said he'd be back soon.
Richard and Jinny knocked off early at the warehouse and came home to prepare the wines for dinner that evening. Two days earlier Roger had sent the McCrady’s sommelier a list of the wines they would provide for the dinner, with instructions for him and the chef to match the food courses to these wines. Most people think wine should be chosen to match the food, but that’s the minor leagues of connoisseurship. Matching food to wine is the real deal. After assembling all the wines on the kitchen counters, Roger opened the reds and double–decanted them. He carefully and slowly poured them into a decanter, then slowly poured them back into the bottles and recorked them. Four or five hours later they would be ready to drink at the restaurant. The two Russian blues watched this procedure with great interest, as did Jinny, watching from a stool and thinking he would have to remember this one. The blues watched from atop the fridge. Roger wondered if they now were being fed up there. Roger wondered where his own dog and cat were. The sommelier arrived to pick up the boxes of wine, with final instructions from Roger. The two Mercedes returned to Charleston.
After a rest and showers and dressing sessions, the Junes, Guignard, Jinny, Peter, and Pater assembled in the kitchen, everyone looking prim and proper. They were going to have a drink before heading over to the restaurant, but this was interrupted by
the unexpected arrival of the Gromstovs and Rodstras, who also were dressed to the teeth. Constantine had a word with Gwen, who led everyone into the living room. Constantine moved the coffee table to the center of the room, and nodded at Henric, who opened two tote bags and dumped the contents on the table. Everyone looked at the cash. Henric said, “We don’t have enough money.” The others didn’t know exactly how to take this. It could mean, “We don’t have enough money, period,” or it could mean, “We don’t have enough money on the table.” Everyone very much hoped he meant the latter. Henric said, “That is $6,300,000, all the cash we could get on a few days' notice in American money. We have more where that came from, but it’s still in Russia.” Everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Thank god, more where that came from.
Constantine said, “Your package so far is good. We like it. If you will help us to figure out how much more money we need, we can order it tomorrow. We have talked, and we know what we want in first part of package to make us all happy. We want two houses, one sailboat, French wines (lots), furniture for houses, some of it Russian from Hermitage, six hand guns, two of which are Russian, two Austrian, and two Italian, the Mercedes, Mr. Adams for writers workshop of romance literature, and other stuff for living here. How much?”
Gwen and Roger realized this was an important moment. This was when the rich Russians were going to commit to the entire package. Full commitment. Gwen told Peter and Pater to take drink orders. Roger told Jinny to call the restaurant, Gale, and Richard, and tell them dinner had been set back one hour. Gwen went to the study and came back with a yellow legal pad and a calculator, which she handed to Roger, and they went into calculation mode.
Gwen began pacing the floor, rattling off items. Roger wrote each item on the legal pad and filled in numbers: Sullivan’s house $2.9M, Kiawah house $3.2M, boat $1.1M, guns $5,000, wine unknown, Richard $10,000, furniture for Sullivan’s $140,000, furniture for Kiawah $150,000, Hermitage stuff for Sullivan’s unknown, Hermitage stuff for Kiawah unknown, miscellaneous stuff for Gromstovs and Rodstras $100,000 each, two Mercedes $180,000.
Gwen listed these items out loud. When she opened her eyes she went and sat next to Roger. Silently they added more items to the list and filled in the blanks: wine $100,000, Hermitage stuff $200,000, Peter and Pater school $200,000, Jinny and Guinard $400,000, Roger and Gwen $400,000. Gwen got up and went and sat close to Slevov, taking hold of her arm. Gwen nodded to Roger, who took the calculator and started tapping. Tap tap tap. Tap tap tap. Tap tap tap.
Roger stopped tapping and wrote on the legal pad. He got up and handed the pad to Gwen, who looked at the bottom line: $9,185,000. She took a deep breath and handed the pad to Slevov. Slevov glanced at it without comment or change in body language, and handed it to her husband. He glanced at it without comment or change in body language, and handed it to Helstof, who handed it to Henric. Henric glanced at it, looked at Constantine, and nodded. Constantine picked up his gin and tonic and said, “Ok.”
Aristocratic Thieves Page 42