Stuart Kaminsky - Tarnished Icons

Sasha knew that Maya would never bring herself to tell her husband’s mother to leave. The rift in the relationship of the two women would be too wide to bridge.

“No,” said Sasha. “I’ll call you later. We’ll have you over for dinner in a day or two.”

“If that’s the way you feel, that’s the way you feel,” she said, resigned and obviously feeling sorry for herself. “I’ll go.”

“And, Mother,” he said, now that he had the nerve, “I think you should call before you come to the apartment. Don’t just drop in. Anyone who simply drops in can be coming at a bad time.”

“You want to get rid of me?” she said angrily.

“No,” he said.

The man on the other phone was looking at him.

“I don’t want to get rid of you,” Sasha continued. “You’re my mother. I love you. I need your warmth, your wisdom, your caring.”

She had ample reason not to believe any of this, but this time she chose to.

“I’m going back to my little apartment now,” she said. “I will take comfort in the always welcoming company of Anna Timofeyeva. I will call you when you are more calm and we can talk about this sanely.”

“Fine,” Sasha said, putting the roll of film back in his pocket.

“You can come to my apartment and we’ll talk calmly,” she said. “Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow won’t be good for me,” said Sasha. “I’ll call you. We’ll make arrangements.”

“We’ll see,” said Lydia skeptically.

Before Sasha could say more, his mother hung up.

“I’ll be late again,” Valentin Spaskov said into the phone.

“Very late?” asked his wife.

“I don’t think so,” he said.

Spaskov’s wife had begun to think there was another woman. Once she had called the station to give him a message when he was supposed to be on duty and had been told that he was not working that night. More and more often he’d been coming home late, almost too depressed to play with his daughter if the girl was still awake. On those nights, Valentin had clung to her in bed.

Did he feel guilty? Did he want to confess? What about the blood he had hidden? She bore it silently, hoping it would end.

“I’ll have food ready for you,” she said as she always did.

“Good. I’ll probably be very hungry,” Spaskov said. “Good-bye.”

“Good-bye,” she said, and hung up the phone.

So did Spaskov, who stood looking down at it for a minute or two, his hands flat on the desk.

If everything went as planned, Spaskov was certain he would have no appetite this night.

Porfiry Petrovich grunted mightily, his hair and brow damp with sweat, his purple-and-white Northwestern University sweatshirt with the tiny hole in the sleeve turned nearly gray from his perspiration. If he did two more bench presses, just two more, it would be a new record for him.

To the voice of Dinah Washington singing “Down with Love” Porfiry Petrovich, in the corner of his living room in his apartment on Karasikov Street, willed his arms and chest to move. Two things other than his own determination were helping him toward the new record. First, using extrastrength green plastic piping, he had designed and built a simple stand onto which he could place the weight as he lay back on the narrow bench. Placing the weight on the stand made it easier to get the weight in the air by not having to awkwardly lift it from the floor. He had no one to spot him on either side, so he had to be sure of the safe extent of both his weights and repetitions. He should have considered such a device years ago. He had seen them, used them in many weight rooms, even one in a small navy weather station in Siberia, but building one had only recently occurred to him. The second thing that made it easier to do the bench presses was the new leg. With his crippled leg he had balanced awkwardly on his right leg while doing the presses. It had taken a major effort just to get the weight to his chest and then down again when he finished. The new leg served as a brace, like the strong leg of a table.

The two girls, as always, sat watching Rostnikov. They sat quietly, listening to the music and to his grunting. Grunting and blowing air were not only part of the ritual, they actually helped him get through each exercise.

They had finished dinner, chicken tabak, Rostnikov’s favorite. He did not ask Sarah where she got the chicken, but he had not eaten with his usual hum of satisfaction. Sarah had something to discuss. He could see it in her face, her movements, in the fact that she had served him his favorite meal. They would talk later, either in bed or seated on the sofa with the lights low.

He, too, had something to tell his wife, but he was somehow sure that what she had to say was more important. It was her look, the look of a witness who had decided after hours or days or years of agony to come forth with what she knew and could no longer keep to herself.

Dinah Washington and Porfiry Petrovich finished together. He placed the weight back on the stand, and the singer concluded with a plaintive low note that nearly brought tears to the detective’s eyes.

He sat up, reached for his towel, and wiped himself as he looked at the girls, who seemed to find even his wiping of sweat fascinating.

“You are the strongest person in the world,” said the older girl.

Rostnikov looked over at Sarah, who sat in her chair across the room reading a book.

Although neither of the two girls had spoken much since their grandmother was taken from them and sent to prison, they had done reasonably well in school from the day the Rostnikovs had taken them in. And now the girls were gradually beginning to speak more and more.

“Sometime I will take you to watch the Olympic hopefuls working out,” he said. “If we’re lucky, we’ll see one of the former champions, a few of whom are now coaches, demonstrate. Then you will see some of the strongest men in the world. And the strongest ever was …”

“Alexiev,” finished the younger child.

Rostnikov smiled. Normally at this point he would turn off the record player, which he now did, put away the bench and weights in the space he had made behind the doors of the bookcase against the wall, which he now did, and change his clothes and shower, which he did not do.

Rostnikov had many loves, beginning with his wife and son and, more recently, the two little girls who were looking up at him from where they were seated. Following his family on his list, a list of which he was never overtly conscious, were his work and his coworkers, weight lifting, American mysteries, particularly those about the police by Ed McBain, and plumbing.

On his days off Rostnikov would often spend hours searching the outdoor stalls around the city for mystery novels in English. An Ed McBain was always a treasure, as was anything in English translation by Georges Simenon, but close behind were Lawrence Block, Donald Westlake, and many others.

When the weights and bench were compactly stored and the bookcase door closed, Rostnikov wiped his brow, neck, and head once more and said to the girls, “Shall we go to work?”

Both children nodded yes and smiled. Rostnikov glanced at Sarah, who looked up and smiled at the trio across the room, but there was something plaintive in her expression.

Rostnikov went into the bedroom and came back with his big plastic toolbox in one hand and five four-foot-long plastic tubes under the other arm. Bulianika and his wife on the fourth floor had come by earlier and left a message with Sarah that their sink was backed up. Sarah had said that if nothing came up at Petrovka, she was sure Porfiry Petrovich would take care of it later.

He told the older girl to get his plastic bucket from the storage box in the kitchen area. She moved quickly.