Stuart Kaminsky - Death Of A Russian Priest

He had been shot at and had shot back. He had even killed criminals. He had seen death, corruption, and misery. Now with a mother, a wife, a child, and another one on the way, he looked forward only to financial disaster, a greater loss of privacy, and increased responsibilities. And now he had this inexperienced woman acting as if she were the one in charge.

“Why do you look so angry?” Elena asked.

“Because I am angry,” Sasha replied. “When I am angry, it shows on my face, if I choose to allow it to show.”

“And you have reasons for this anger?”

“I have reasons,” he said, plunging his hands into his pockets.

“Which you do not wish to share.”

“Which I do not wish to share.”

“Try a slice this time,” she said, looking over his shoulder at the well-dressed businessman directly in front of them who was shifting his shopping bag from one hand to the other.

“I think I’ll eat two slices,” Sasha said casually.

Elena shrugged.

Sasha wasn’t even hungry. He had eaten some bread and kasha with tea before he left home. He had made breakfast for his pregnant wife, Maya. Sasha’s mother, Lydia, had been in the living room, the only other room in the apartment, when Sasha had brought his wife breakfast in her bed. The doctor, Sarah Rostnikov’s cousin, had insisted that Maya move as little as possible until the pains started or her water broke.

The irony of this was that Sasha, Maya, and their daughter, Pulcharia, had recently moved in order to have some privacy from Lydia, whom Sasha loved dearly, as one should love a mother, but who, he admitted, was difficult enough to drive a monk to suicide. She was close to deaf and would do nothing about it. She was uncompromising on food preparation, etiquette, child care, and hygiene. Maya had urged Sasha to use his position as a policeman to find a way to exchange their old apartment for a small one for them and another small one for Lydia, and he had done so with guilt but with little regret. Now, only weeks after the separation, Lydia, with a leave of absence from her government job, was back in their apartment to help take care of Maya and Pulcharia, who was now almost two. There was no sign that his mother ever contemplated moving out when the baby came.

Maya had told him to be patient and he had tried to be. This morning he asked Lydia if she had seen his tooflyee, his shoes, and she answered, “Like your father. He was thirty when he started to say crazy things.” Then she looked at her son and said, in a tone obviously meant only for a demented child, “Why are you looking for a tighgah ?”

“I am not looking for a rain forest,” Sasha had answered, without raising his voice, as Lydia looked at Pulcharia for confirmation of what Sasha had really said.

Now, to add to his misery, he was spending his days with Elena Timofeyeva instead of Zelach, his usual partner. Zelach was recovering from the near loss of his eye, an injury he might never have sustained if Sasha had been doing his job instead of being seduced by a suspect. Zelach was an amiable, if exasperatingly slow, hulk of a man. There was no doubt of who was in charge when he and Zelach were on an assignment.

Sasha wanted to put his hands over his ears to warm them, but he looked at Elena, who was hatless, and decided to suffer.

“You look cold,” she said. Her thigh-length cloth coat was not even buttoned. “It will warm up later.”

“I’m fine,” Sasha said, though he now feared that he might be coming down with a cold.

“If you want to go stand in the metro entrance, I’ll bring the pizzas,” she said.

“I am not the least bit cold,” Sasha said emphatically.

Elena shrugged and looked at the man with me shopping bag. The man tried to ignore the scrutiny by feigning a great interest in a lumber truck parked in front of a government food shop.

“You see the man ahead of us?” Sasha suddenly said in a whisper that could be heard for at least half a block.

The man couldn’t help turning his head slightly in their direction. Elena looked at the man with sympathy, which seemed to increase his discomfort.

As the line moved forward a flurry of automobile horns signaled a battle over a few feet of space on Kalinin Street.

Sasha looked at Elena. She was a bit hefty for his taste, but he had to admit that her face was pleasant, her skin clear, her eyes blue, and her teeth, though a bit large, remarkably even and cleaner looking than most Russians. Her dark hair was just long enough to be pulled back and tied behind her head with a rubber band. At that moment of unnecessary embarrassment Sasha was glad that he did not find her particularly attractive. He loved his wife, her voice, her laugh, her face, but all too often he had been betrayed by his flesh.

“What about the man?” Elena asked.

“It’s Semykin,” he said. “Gregor Semykin, the one who was arrested with Folyoskov last year, the glass-tumbler case.”

Elena looked at the man, who was now studying the fascinating head of the woman in front of him. The line moved forward. “It is not Semykin,” she whispered. “The man looks nothing like Semykin. Semykin is in jail. Semykin is short.”

“Perhaps it’s his brother,” Sasha replied. “The similarity-”

The man in front of them suddenly looked at his watch, gave the impression that he had forgotten an important meeting, and left the line hurriedly.

Sasha urged Elena forward in the line.

“That was unnecessary,” she said.

“We’re in a hurry. You said we’re in a hurry. Besides, the man was guilty of something or he wouldn’t have run.”

The warmth of the truck made a difference now that they were only two customers away from being served.

“Everyone is guilty of something,” Elena said. “It makes-”

“And it is our task to find out what it is,” Sasha said, standing on his toes so he could get a better view of the interior of the pizza truck.

“Only if they are guilty of a crime,” Elena said.

“There are so many crimes,” he said with a shrug. “And there’ll soon be new crimes. Crimes against the rights of individuals, women, crimes against dignity. This is too serious and I am hungry.”

They stood in front of the truck window now. The line behind them numbered about forty.

“No more,” said the man in the window. “We’re out of pizzas.”

He was a heavy man in need of a shave. Perched on his head of unruly black hair was a white cap designed to protect the food. His smile revealed teeth in need of emergency dentistry.

“We’re the police,” Sasha said.

The man shouted over their heads, “You see, there is no more cheese. I’m not a magician who can make cheese appear where there is no cheese. And I do not make pizzas without cheese. So, no more pizza today.”

The line held for a moment and then, amid groans and threats, it broke up. The man with the white cap and bad teeth started to close the doors.

“We are the police,” Sasha repeated.

“Once that meant something,” the man said, leaning forward, “but read the papers, turn on the television. Look at the political paintings being sold on the walls of this very street. The police can’t threaten. Boris Yeltsin will not tolerate it. We are becoming a democracy. A democracy with no cheese. If you were cows and could give me cheese, we would have something to talk about.”

“You are not humorous,” Sasha Tkach said, looking at Elena. She did not seem to be enjoying the scene.

“Then do me a favor. Don’t hire me as a comedian.”

Sasha felt Elena’s hand on his shoulder and turned to shrug it off so he could carry on his debate with the pizza man, who now had one of the doors almost closed. Elena stepped in front of Sasha and gave the pizza man her best smile. The man returned a frown.